Clean up your #include statements?

Question

How do you maintain the #include statements in your C or C++ project? It seems almost inevitable that eventually the set of include statements in a file is either insufficie

Answer 1

Detecting superfluous includes has already been discussed in this question.

I'm not aware of any tools to help detect insufficient-but-happens-to-work includes, but good coding conventions can help here. For example, the Google C++ Style Guide mandates the following, with the goal of reducing hidden dependencies:

In dir/foo.cc, whose main purpose is to implement or test the stuff in dir2/foo2.h, order your includes as follows:

1. dir2/foo2.h (preferred location — see details below).
2. C system files.
3. C++ system files.
4. Other libraries' .h files.
5. Your project's .h files.