这里有一个算法，它在不创建新的中间列表的情况下处理列表，类似于Ber在https://stackoverflow.com/a/108651/184528.

def permute(xs, low=0):
    if low + 1 >= len(xs):
        yield xs
    else:
        for p in permute(xs, low + 1):
            yield p        
        for i in range(low + 1, len(xs)):        
            xs[low], xs[i] = xs[i], xs[low]
            for p in permute(xs, low + 1):
                yield p        
            xs[low], xs[i] = xs[i], xs[low]

for p in permute([1, 2, 3, 4]):
    print p

您可以在这里亲自尝试代码：http://repl.it/J9v

如果有人喜欢这个丑陋的单行线（虽然只适用于字符串）：

def p(a):
    return a if len(a) == 1 else [[a[i], *j] for i in range(len(a)) for j in p(a[:i] + a[i + 1:])]

def permutations(head, tail=''):
    if len(head) == 0:
        print(tail)
    else:
        for i in range(len(head)):
            permutations(head[:i] + head[i+1:], tail + head[i])

称为：

permutations('abc')

这是受Haskell实现使用列表理解的启发：

def permutation(list):
    if len(list) == 0:
        return [[]]
    else:
        return [[x] + ys for x in list for ys in permutation(delete(list, x))]

def delete(list, item):
    lc = list[:]
    lc.remove(item)
    return lc

此解决方案实现了一个生成器，以避免在内存中保留所有排列：

def permutations (orig_list):
    if not isinstance(orig_list, list):
        orig_list = list(orig_list)

    yield orig_list

    if len(orig_list) == 1:
        return

    for n in sorted(orig_list):
        new_list = orig_list[:]
        pos = new_list.index(n)
        del(new_list[pos])
        new_list.insert(0, n)
        for resto in permutations(new_list[1:]):
            if new_list[:1] + resto <> orig_list:
                yield new_list[:1] + resto

def permuteArray (arr):

    arraySize = len(arr)

    permutedList = []

    if arraySize == 1:
        return [arr]

    i = 0

    for item in arr:

        for elem in permuteArray(arr[:i] + arr[i + 1:]):
            permutedList.append([item] + elem)

        i = i + 1    

    return permutedList

我不打算在一个新的行中穷尽所有的可能性，以使它有点独特。