Docker-compose exclude service by default

Question

If I have a great many services defined in a docker-compose project, how can I exclude a service from the default docker-compose up command?

For example, I

Answer 1

Not exactly what you're looking for but you could use the scale flag to scale your ssl service to zero:

docker-compose up --scale ssl_service=0

Another option is to have multiple compose files and run docker with the -f flag to start specific services.