FactoryMethod problem - header inclusion horror - expert

Header include horror - expert

Hello group.

For a few days I have very strange problem in my C++ code. It's not
trivial, I use forward declarations, I use header inclusion guards but
it still won't work. I also showed this code to two fellow C++
programmers and we're still at dead end. Obviously there's something
wrong or I miss something.

I have trivial StuffBase class and StuffDerived class that derives
from it. StuffBase has a pointer to Mother object instance. Mother has
a pointer to one StuffBase object instance. Mother has a method
CreateObject (const int) to create one StuffBase's instance. It uses
simple static StuffFactory that returns StuffBase*.

Problem seems easy, but during compilation MSVC++8 compiler returns
error: base class undefined for StuffDerived.h:

//--- File StuffDerived.h ---

#ifndef __stuffderived__h_
#define __stuffderived__h_

#include "stuffbase.h"

class StuffDerived : public StuffBase
{
public:
    StuffDerived (const Mother* mother);

    void DoSomething ();

    virtual ~StuffDerived ();
} ;

#endif

//--- End file ---

When I remove #include "stufffactory.h" from mother.h and comment out
line that creates object out from factory everything compiles well.
Also when I call factory method in main (), "from outside" it works
well.

I hope experts can point out my error and explain why is it not
working properly. If not I hope you can provide me a solution.

Full code (10 files: StuffBase.h/.cpp, StuffDerived.h/.cpp,
Mother.h/.cpp, StuffFactory.h/.cpp, FactoryMethodProblem.cpp,
stdafx.h) is availible inline below, or here zipped :
http://www.haze.ehost.pl/pub/FactoryMethodProblem.zip .

Greetings,
Tomasz Kalkosi?ski

//--- File StuffBase.h ---

#ifndef __stuffbase__h_
#define __stuffbase__h_

#include "mother.h"

class Mother;

class StuffBase
{
protected:
    int a;

public:

    const Mother* mother;

    StuffBase (const Mother* mother);

    void DoSomething ();

    virtual ~StuffBase ();
} ;

#endif

//--- End file ---

//--- File StuffBase.cpp ---

#include "stuffbase.h"

    StuffBase::StuffBase (const Mother* mother) :
        mother (mother),
        a (1)
    {}

    void StuffBase::DoSomething ()
    {}

    StuffBase::~StuffBase ()
    {}

//--- End file ---

//--- File StuffDerived.h ---

#ifndef __stuffderived__h_
#define __stuffderived__h_

#include "stuffbase.h"

class StuffDerived : public StuffBase
{
public:
    StuffDerived (const Mother* mother);

    void DoSomething ();

    virtual ~StuffDerived ();
} ;

#endif

//--- End file ---

//--- File StuffDerived.cpp ---

#include "stuffderived.h"

StuffDerived::StuffDerived (const Mother* mother) :
    StuffBase (mother)
{}

void StuffDerived::DoSomething ()
{}

StuffDerived::~StuffDerived ()
{}

//--- End file ---

//--- File Mother.h ---

#ifndef __mother__h_
#define __mother__h_

#include "stuffbase.h"
#include "stufffactory.h"

class StuffBase;

class Mother
{
public:

    StuffBase* base;

    Mother ();

    void CreateObject (const int i);
} ;

#endif

//--- End file ---

//--- File Mother.cpp ---

#include "mother.h"

Mother::Mother ()
{}

void Mother::CreateObject (const int i)
{
    this->base = StuffFactory::CreateObject (i, this);
}

//--- End file ---

//--- File StuffFactory.h ---

#ifndef __stufffactory__h_
#define __stufffactory__h_

#include "stuffbase.h"
#include "stuffderived.h"

class StuffFactory
{
public:
    static StuffBase* CreateObject (const int i, const Mother*
mother);
} ;

#endif

//--- End file ---

//--- File StuffFactory.cpp ---

#include "stufffactory.h"

StuffBase* StuffFactory::CreateObject (const int i, const Mother*
mother)
{
    switch (i)
        {
        case 1:
            return new StuffDerived (mother);
        default:
            return new StuffBase (mother);
        }
}

//--- End file ---

//--- File FactoryMethodProblem.cpp ---

// FactoryMethodProblem.cpp : Defines the entry point for the console
application.
//

#include "stdafx.h"

#include "mother.h"
#include "stufffactory.h"

int _tmain(int argc, _TCHAR* argv[])
{
    Mother* mother = new Mother ();
    mother->CreateObject (0);
    mother->base = StuffFactory::CreateObject (0, 0);

    return 0;
}

/*
#include "stufffactory.h"

int _tmain(int argc, _TCHAR* argv[])
{
    StuffBase* base = StuffFactory::CreateObject (1, 0);

    return 0;
}
*/

//--- End file ---

//--- File stdafx.h ---

// stdafx.h : include file for standard system include files,
// or project specific include files that are used frequently, but
// are changed infrequently
//

#pragma once

#ifndef _WIN32_WINNT // Allow use of features specific to Windows XP
or later.
#define _WIN32_WINNT 0x0501 // Change this to the appropriate value to
target other versions of Windows.
#endif

#include <stdio.h>
#include <tchar.h>

// TODO: reference additional headers your program requires here

//--- End file ---

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