You can archive a directory using tar and exclude files or sub-directories using the “exclude” parameter:

tar cvjf ORIG DEST –exclude=PATTERN

*ORIG: the origin directory. I.E: /home/me

*DEST the destination archive file. I.E: /home/me/Desktop/home.tar.bz2

*PATTERN: file & subdirectories exclusion pattern. I.E: .* (excludes all hidden files)

Note: –exclude has two hyphens