Just stumbled upon this and had the same problem a while ago, so I will try to share my experience.
At first it depends on who the other VCS users are or better, which programs they will use. If they do not use Eclipse, these files will only pollute their projects. If they use Eclipse, the files may be useful for them, but in my last project I did not include them for the following reasons:
Everyone had a different system, which meant different paths for inclusions, etc. In conclusion, I reviewed the contents of these files to find out if they should be used:
.cproject . Included here are listed, so on each platform you will have different files. → leave
.project . Some environment-dependent paths have also been found here. Perhaps this also has problems installing different plugins. → leave
.settings . It is sometimes useful to share settings, but usually this is the decision of each developer. → leave
.autotools : I have not used this, so I can not say anything about it.
Summary
It seems better to leave these files from the repository.
For Eclipse, this creates the problem of creating a new project when importing from VCS. In this case, you should give recommendations on how to configure the project for proper configuration.
When you put project files in VCS, those who don’t use Eclipse are likely to have less problems than those who do, because the files are simply ignored on their website and Eclipse users will have to reconfigure them for their system.
There may be a better way to share these projects, but I haven't found it yet.