diff --git a/Prebuild/src/Core/Kernel.cs b/Prebuild/src/Core/Kernel.cs
index 52087c002d..53d01889fe 100755
--- a/Prebuild/src/Core/Kernel.cs
+++ b/Prebuild/src/Core/Kernel.cs
@@ -100,6 +100,7 @@ namespace Prebuild.Core
         bool m_PauseAfterFinish;
         string[] m_ProjectGroups;
 
+        public HashSet<string> excludeFolders = new HashSet<string>(StringComparer.InvariantCultureIgnoreCase);
         #endregion
 
         #region Constructors
@@ -673,7 +674,7 @@ namespace Prebuild.Core
             }
             m_Clean = m_CommandLine["clean"];
             string removeDirs = m_CommandLine["removedir"];
-            if (removeDirs != null && removeDirs.Length == 0)
+            if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(removeDirs))
             {
                 m_RemoveDirectories = removeDirs.Split('|');
             }
@@ -685,6 +686,20 @@ namespace Prebuild.Core
             }
             m_PauseAfterFinish = m_CommandLine.WasPassed("pause");
 
+            string excludeDirstr = m_CommandLine["excludedir"];
+            if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(excludeDirstr))
+            {
+                string[] ex = excludeDirstr.Split(new char[] {'|'}, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries);
+                if(ex.Length > 0)
+                {
+                    foreach(string s in ex)
+                    {
+                        string st = s.Trim();
+                        if(st.Length > 0)
+                            excludeFolders.Add(st);
+                    }
+                }
+            }
             //LoadSchema();
         }
 
diff --git a/Prebuild/src/Core/Nodes/MatchNode.cs b/Prebuild/src/Core/Nodes/MatchNode.cs
index cc66767260..69e89c3e60 100644
--- a/Prebuild/src/Core/Nodes/MatchNode.cs
+++ b/Prebuild/src/Core/Nodes/MatchNode.cs
@@ -261,6 +261,9 @@ namespace Prebuild.Core.Nodes
                             // a significant performance hit when running on a network drive.
                             if (str.EndsWith(".svn"))
                                 continue;
+                            string dname = Path.GetFileName(str);
+                            if(Kernel.Instance.excludeFolders.Contains(dname))
+                                continue;
 
                             RecurseDirectories(Helper.NormalizePath(str), pattern, recurse, useRegex, exclusions);
                         }
@@ -345,7 +348,6 @@ namespace Prebuild.Core.Nodes
                 throw new WarningException("Could not compile regex pattern: {0}", ex.Message);
             }
 
-
             foreach (XmlNode child in node.ChildNodes)
             {
                 IDataNode dataNode = Kernel.Instance.ParseNode(child, this);
diff --git a/bin/Prebuild.exe b/bin/Prebuild.exe
index 253d3064b5..03837d5ebd 100755
Binary files a/bin/Prebuild.exe and b/bin/Prebuild.exe differ
diff --git a/runprebuild.bat b/runprebuild.bat
index e5ec6e0287..bdd77a1502 100755
--- a/runprebuild.bat
+++ b/runprebuild.bat
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 @echo OFF
 
-bin\Prebuild.exe /target vs2015
+bin\Prebuild.exe /target vs2015 /excludedir = "obj | bin"
 
 setlocal ENABLEEXTENSIONS
 set VALUE_NAME=MSBuildToolsPath
diff --git a/runprebuild.sh b/runprebuild.sh
index 6848188ff9..3f81df390c 100755
--- a/runprebuild.sh
+++ b/runprebuild.sh
@@ -18,7 +18,7 @@ case "$1" in
   *)
 
     mono bin/Prebuild.exe /target nant
-    mono bin/Prebuild.exe /target vs2015
+    mono bin/Prebuild.exe /target vs2015 /excludedir = "obj | bin"
 
   ;;
 
diff --git a/runprebuild48.bat b/runprebuild48.bat
index 6c75220d12..151dd90f80 100644
--- a/runprebuild48.bat
+++ b/runprebuild48.bat
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 @echo OFF
 
-bin\Prebuild.exe /target vs2019 /targetframework v4_8
+bin\Prebuild.exe /target vs2019 /targetframework v4_8 /excludedir = "obj | bin"
 
 setlocal ENABLEEXTENSIONS
 set VALUE_NAME=MSBuildToolsPath
diff --git a/runprebuild48.sh b/runprebuild48.sh
index cca98f2ca1..bb87334d8c 100755
--- a/runprebuild48.sh
+++ b/runprebuild48.sh
@@ -19,7 +19,7 @@ case "$1" in
 
   *)
 
-    mono bin/Prebuild.exe /target vs2019 /targetframework v4_8
+    mono bin/Prebuild.exe /target vs2019 /targetframework v4_8 /excludedir = "obj | bin"
 
   ;;