How can I get `find` to ignore .svn directories?

Question

I often use the find command to search through source code, delete files, whatever. Annoyingly, because Subversion stores duplicates of each file in its .svn/text-base/ directories my simple searches end up getting lots of duplicate results. For example, I want to recursively search for uint in multiple messages.h and messages.cpp files:

# find -name 'messages.*' -exec grep -Iw uint {} +
./messages.cpp:            Log::verbose << "Discarding out of date message: id " << uint(olderMessage.id)
./messages.cpp:    Log::verbose << "Added to send queue: " << *message << ": id " << uint(preparedMessage->id)
./messages.cpp:                Log::error << "Received message with invalid SHA-1 hash: id " << uint(incomingMessage.id)
./messages.cpp:            Log::verbose << "Received " << *message << ": id " << uint(incomingMessage.id)
./messages.cpp:            Log::verbose << "Sent message: id " << uint(preparedMessage->id)
./messages.cpp:        Log::verbose << "Discarding unsent message: id " << uint(preparedMessage->id)
./messages.cpp:        for (uint i = 0; i < 10 && !_stopThreads; ++i) {
./.svn/text-base/messages.cpp.svn-base:            Log::verbose << "Discarding out of date message: id " << uint(olderMessage.id)
./.svn/text-base/messages.cpp.svn-base:    Log::verbose << "Added to send queue: " << *message << ": id " << uint(preparedMessage->id)
./.svn/text-base/messages.cpp.svn-base:                Log::error << "Received message with invalid SHA-1 hash: id " << uint(incomingMessage.id)
./.svn/text-base/messages.cpp.svn-base:            Log::verbose << "Received " << *message << ": id " << uint(incomingMessage.id)
./.svn/text-base/messages.cpp.svn-base:            Log::verbose << "Sent message: id " << uint(preparedMessage->id)
./.svn/text-base/messages.cpp.svn-base:        Log::verbose << "Discarding unsent message: id " << uint(preparedMessage->id)
./.svn/text-base/messages.cpp.svn-base:        for (uint i = 0; i < 10 && !_stopThreads; ++i) {
./virus/messages.cpp:void VsMessageProcessor::_progress(const string &fileName, uint scanCount)
./virus/messages.cpp:ProgressMessage::ProgressMessage(const string &fileName, uint scanCount)
./virus/messages.h:    void _progress(const std::string &fileName, uint scanCount);
./virus/messages.h:    ProgressMessage(const std::string &fileName, uint scanCount);
./virus/messages.h:    uint        _scanCount;
./virus/.svn/text-base/messages.cpp.svn-base:void VsMessageProcessor::_progress(const string &fileName, uint scanCount)
./virus/.svn/text-base/messages.cpp.svn-base:ProgressMessage::ProgressMessage(const string &fileName, uint scanCount)
./virus/.svn/text-base/messages.h.svn-base:    void _progress(const std::string &fileName, uint scanCount);
./virus/.svn/text-base/messages.h.svn-base:    ProgressMessage(const std::string &fileName, uint scanCount);
./virus/.svn/text-base/messages.h.svn-base:    uint        _scanCount;

How can I tell find to ignore the .svn directories?

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Update: If you upgrade your SVN client to version 1.7 this is no longer an issue.

A key feature of the changes introduced in Subversion 1.7 is the centralization of working copy metadata storage into a single location. Instead of a .svn directory in every directory in the working copy, Subversion 1.7 working copies have just one .svn directory—in the root of the working copy. This directory includes (among other things) an SQLite-backed database which contains all of the metadata Subversion needs for that working copy.

Answer 1

why not just

find . -not -iwholename '*.svn*'

The -not predicate negates everything that has .svn anywhere in the path.

So in your case it would be

find -not -iwholename '*.svn*' -name 'messages.*' -exec grep -Iw uint {} + \;