以下是我在《破解编程面试》(P54)一书中提出的解决方案:

/**
 * List permutations of a string.
 * 
 * @param s the input string
 * @return  the list of permutations
 */
public static ArrayList<String> permutation(String s) {
    // The result
    ArrayList<String> res = new ArrayList<String>();
    // If input string's length is 1, return {s}
    if (s.length() == 1) {
        res.add(s);
    } else if (s.length() > 1) {
        int lastIndex = s.length() - 1;
        // Find out the last character
        String last = s.substring(lastIndex);
        // Rest of the string
        String rest = s.substring(0, lastIndex);
        // Perform permutation on the rest string and
        // merge with the last character
        res = merge(permutation(rest), last);
    }
    return res;
}

/**
 * @param list a result of permutation, e.g. {"ab", "ba"}
 * @param c    the last character
 * @return     a merged new list, e.g. {"cab", "acb" ... }
 */
public static ArrayList<String> merge(ArrayList<String> list, String c) {
    ArrayList<String> res = new ArrayList<>();
    // Loop through all the string in the list
    for (String s : list) {
        // For each string, insert the last character to all possible positions
        // and add them to the new list
        for (int i = 0; i <= s.length(); ++i) {
            String ps = new StringBuffer(s).insert(i, c).toString();
            res.add(ps);
        }
    }
    return res;
}

字符串"abcd"的运行输出:

第一步:合并[a]和b: [ba, ab] 步骤2:Merge [ba, ab]和c: [cba, bca, bac, cab, acb, abc] 第三步:Merge [cba, bca, bac, cab, acb, abc]和d: [dcba, cdba, cbad, cbca, bdcad

串的排列:

public static void main(String args[]) {
    permu(0,"ABCD");
}

static void permu(int fixed,String s) {
    char[] chr=s.toCharArray();
    if(fixed==s.length())
        System.out.println(s);
    for(int i=fixed;i<s.length();i++) {
        char c=chr[i];
        chr[i]=chr[fixed];
        chr[fixed]=c;
        permu(fixed+1,new String(chr));
    }   
}

递归Python解决方案

def permute(input_str):
    _permute("", input_str)

def _permute(prefix, str_to_permute):
    if str_to_permute == '':
        print(prefix)

    else:
        for i in range(len(str_to_permute)): 
            _permute(prefix+str_to_permute[i], str_to_permute[0:i] + str_to_permute[i+1:])

if __name__ == '__main__':
    permute('foobar')

Java中一个非常基本的解决方案是使用递归+设置(以避免重复)，如果你想存储和返回解决方案字符串:

public static Set<String> generatePerm(String input)
{
    Set<String> set = new HashSet<String>();
    if (input == "")
        return set;

    Character a = input.charAt(0);

    if (input.length() > 1)
    {
        input = input.substring(1);

        Set<String> permSet = generatePerm(input);

        for (String x : permSet)
        {
            for (int i = 0; i <= x.length(); i++)
            {
                set.add(x.substring(0, i) + a + x.substring(i));
            }
        }
    }
    else
    {
        set.add(a + "");
    }
    return set;
}

使用递归。

依次尝试每个字母作为第一个字母，然后使用递归调用找到剩余字母的所有排列。 基本情况是，当输入是空字符串时，唯一的排列就是空字符串。

改进的代码相同

    static String permutationStr[];
    static int indexStr = 0;

    static int factorial (int i) {
        if (i == 1)
            return 1;
        else
            return i * factorial(i-1);
    }

    public static void permutation(String str) {
        char strArr[] = str.toLowerCase().toCharArray();
        java.util.Arrays.sort(strArr);

        int count = 1, dr = 1;
        for (int i = 0; i < strArr.length-1; i++){
            if ( strArr[i] == strArr[i+1]) {
                count++;
            } else {
                dr *= factorial(count);
                count = 1;
            }       
        }
        dr *= factorial(count);

        count = factorial(strArr.length) / dr;

        permutationStr = new String[count];

        permutation("", str);

        for (String oneStr : permutationStr){
            System.out.println(oneStr);
        }
    }

    private static void permutation(String prefix, String str) {
        int n = str.length();
        if (n == 0) {
            for (int i = 0; i < indexStr; i++){
                if(permutationStr[i].equals(prefix))
                    return;
            }        
            permutationStr[indexStr++] = prefix;
        } else {
            for (int i = 0; i < n; i++) {
                permutation(prefix + str.charAt(i), str.substring(0, i) + str.substring(i + 1, n));
            }
        }
    }