#include <stdio.h>

unsigned int next_combination(unsigned int *ar, size_t n, unsigned int k)
{
    unsigned int finished = 0;
    unsigned int changed = 0;
    unsigned int i;

    if (k > 0) {
        for (i = k - 1; !finished && !changed; i--) {
            if (ar[i] < (n - 1) - (k - 1) + i) {
                /* Increment this element */
                ar[i]++;
                if (i < k - 1) {
                    /* Turn the elements after it into a linear sequence */
                    unsigned int j;
                    for (j = i + 1; j < k; j++) {
                        ar[j] = ar[j - 1] + 1;
                    }
                }
                changed = 1;
            }
            finished = i == 0;
        }
        if (!changed) {
            /* Reset to first combination */
            for (i = 0; i < k; i++) {
                ar[i] = i;
            }
        }
    }
    return changed;
}

typedef void(*printfn)(const void *, FILE *);

void print_set(const unsigned int *ar, size_t len, const void **elements,
    const char *brackets, printfn print, FILE *fptr)
{
    unsigned int i;
    fputc(brackets[0], fptr);
    for (i = 0; i < len; i++) {
        print(elements[ar[i]], fptr);
        if (i < len - 1) {
            fputs(", ", fptr);
        }
    }
    fputc(brackets[1], fptr);
}

int main(void)
{
    unsigned int numbers[] = { 0, 1, 2 };
    char *elements[] = { "a", "b", "c", "d", "e" };
    const unsigned int k = sizeof(numbers) / sizeof(unsigned int);
    const unsigned int n = sizeof(elements) / sizeof(const char*);

    do {
        print_set(numbers, k, (void*)elements, "[]", (printfn)fputs, stdout);
        putchar('\n');
    } while (next_combination(numbers, n, k));
    getchar();
    return 0;
}

《计算机程序设计艺术》第4卷第3册有大量这样的内容，它们可能比我描述的更适合你的特定情况。

格雷码

你会遇到的一个问题当然是内存，很快，你会在你的集合中遇到20个元素的问题——20C3 = 1140。如果你想遍历这个集合，最好使用修改过的灰码算法，这样你就不会把它们都保存在内存中。这将从前一个组合中生成下一个组合并避免重复。有很多不同的用途。我们想要最大化连续组合之间的差异吗?最小化?等等。

一些描述灰色代码的原始论文:

Hamilton路径与最小变化算法 相邻交换组合生成算法

以下是涉及该主题的其他一些论文:

Eades、Hickey、Read相邻交换组合生成算法的高效实现(PDF, Pascal代码) 结合发电机 组合灰色编码综述(PostScript) 灰色编码的一种算法

Chase's Twiddle(算法)

菲利普·J·蔡斯，《算法382:N个对象中M个对象的组合》(1970)

该算法在C…

按字典顺序排列的组合索引(Buckles算法515)

还可以通过索引(按字典顺序)引用组合。意识到索引应该是基于索引从右到左的一些变化，我们可以构造一些应该恢复组合的东西。

So, we have a set {1,2,3,4,5,6}... and we want three elements. Let's say {1,2,3} we can say that the difference between the elements is one and in order and minimal. {1,2,4} has one change and is lexicographically number 2. So the number of 'changes' in the last place accounts for one change in the lexicographical ordering. The second place, with one change {1,3,4} has one change but accounts for more change since it's in the second place (proportional to the number of elements in the original set).

我所描述的方法是一种解构，从集合到索引，我们需要做相反的事情——这要复杂得多。这就是巴克尔斯解决问题的方法。我写了一些C来计算它们，做了一些小改动——我使用集合的索引而不是一个数字范围来表示集合，所以我们总是从0…n开始工作。 注意:

由于组合是无序的，{1,3,2}={1,2,3}——我们将它们按字典顺序排列。 该方法有一个隐式的0来开始第一个差值集。

词典顺序组合索引(麦卡弗里)

还有另一种方法:，它的概念更容易掌握和编程，但它没有Buckles的优化。幸运的是，它也不会产生重复的组合:

最大化的集合，其中。

例如:27 = C (6, 4) + C (5,3) + C (2, 2) + C(1, 1)。那么，第27个单词的字典组合是{1,2,5,6}，它们是你想要查找的任何集合的索引。下面的例子(OCaml)，需要选择函数，留给读者:

(* this will find the [x] combination of a [set] list when taking [k] elements *)
let combination_maccaffery set k x =
    (* maximize function -- maximize a that is aCb              *)
    (* return largest c where c < i and choose(c,i) <= z        *)
    let rec maximize a b x =
        if (choose a b ) <= x then a else maximize (a-1) b x
    in
    let rec iterate n x i = match i with
        | 0 -> []
        | i ->
            let max = maximize n i x in
            max :: iterate n (x - (choose max i)) (i-1)
    in
    if x < 0 then failwith "errors" else
    let idxs =  iterate (List.length set) x k in
    List.map (List.nth set) (List.sort (-) idxs)

一个小而简单的组合迭代器

为了教学目的，提供了以下两个算法。它们实现了一个迭代器和(更通用的)文件夹整体组合。 它们尽可能快，复杂度为O(nCk)。内存消耗受k约束。

我们将从迭代器开始，它将为每个组合调用用户提供的函数

let iter_combs n k f =
  let rec iter v s j =
    if j = k then f v
    else for i = s to n - 1 do iter (i::v) (i+1) (j+1) done in
  iter [] 0 0

更通用的版本将从初始状态开始调用用户提供的函数和状态变量。因为我们需要在不同的状态之间传递状态，所以我们不使用for循环，而是使用递归，

let fold_combs n k f x =
  let rec loop i s c x =
    if i < n then
      loop (i+1) s c @@
      let c = i::c and s = s + 1 and i = i + 1 in
      if s < k then loop i s c x else f c x
    else x in
  loop 0 0 [] x

这是我想出的解决这个问题的算法。它是用c++编写的，但是可以适应几乎任何支持位操作的语言。

void r_nCr(const unsigned int &startNum, const unsigned int &bitVal, const unsigned int &testNum) // Should be called with arguments (2^r)-1, 2^(r-1), 2^(n-1)
{
    unsigned int n = (startNum - bitVal) << 1;
    n += bitVal ? 1 : 0;

    for (unsigned int i = log2(testNum) + 1; i > 0; i--) // Prints combination as a series of 1s and 0s
        cout << (n >> (i - 1) & 1);
    cout << endl;

    if (!(n & testNum) && n != startNum)
        r_nCr(n, bitVal, testNum);

    if (bitVal && bitVal < testNum)
        r_nCr(startNum, bitVal >> 1, testNum);
}

你可以在这里看到它如何工作的解释。

void combine(char a[], int N, int M, int m, int start, char result[]) {
    if (0 == m) {
        for (int i = M - 1; i >= 0; i--)
            std::cout << result[i];
        std::cout << std::endl;
        return;
    }
    for (int i = start; i < (N - m + 1); i++) {
        result[m - 1] = a[i];
        combine(a, N, M, m-1, i+1, result);
    }
}

void combine(char a[], int N, int M) {
    char *result = new char[M];
    combine(a, N, M, M, 0, result);
    delete[] result;
}

在第一个函数中，m表示还需要选择多少个，start表示必须从数组中的哪个位置开始选择。

这是我用c++写的命题

我尽可能少地限制迭代器类型，所以这个解决方案假设只有前向迭代器，它可以是const_iterator。这应该适用于任何标准容器。在参数没有意义的情况下，它抛出std:: invalid_argument

#include <vector>
#include <stdexcept>

template <typename Fci> // Fci - forward const iterator
std::vector<std::vector<Fci> >
enumerate_combinations(Fci begin, Fci end, unsigned int combination_size)
{
    if(begin == end && combination_size > 0u)
        throw std::invalid_argument("empty set and positive combination size!");
    std::vector<std::vector<Fci> > result; // empty set of combinations
    if(combination_size == 0u) return result; // there is exactly one combination of
                                              // size 0 - emty set
    std::vector<Fci> current_combination;
    current_combination.reserve(combination_size + 1u); // I reserve one aditional slot
                                                        // in my vector to store
                                                        // the end sentinel there.
                                                        // The code is cleaner thanks to that
    for(unsigned int i = 0u; i < combination_size && begin != end; ++i, ++begin)
    {
        current_combination.push_back(begin); // Construction of the first combination
    }
    // Since I assume the itarators support only incrementing, I have to iterate over
    // the set to get its size, which is expensive. Here I had to itrate anyway to  
    // produce the first cobination, so I use the loop to also check the size.
    if(current_combination.size() < combination_size)
        throw std::invalid_argument("combination size > set size!");
    result.push_back(current_combination); // Store the first combination in the results set
    current_combination.push_back(end); // Here I add mentioned earlier sentinel to
                                        // simplyfy rest of the code. If I did it 
                                        // earlier, previous statement would get ugly.
    while(true)
    {
        unsigned int i = combination_size;
        Fci tmp;                            // Thanks to the sentinel I can find first
        do                                  // iterator to change, simply by scaning
        {                                   // from right to left and looking for the
            tmp = current_combination[--i]; // first "bubble". The fact, that it's 
            ++tmp;                          // a forward iterator makes it ugly but I
        }                                   // can't help it.
        while(i > 0u && tmp == current_combination[i + 1u]);

        // Here is probably my most obfuscated expression.
        // Loop above looks for a "bubble". If there is no "bubble", that means, that
        // current_combination is the last combination, Expression in the if statement
        // below evaluates to true and the function exits returning result.
        // If the "bubble" is found however, the ststement below has a sideeffect of 
        // incrementing the first iterator to the left of the "bubble".
        if(++current_combination[i] == current_combination[i + 1u])
            return result;
        // Rest of the code sets posiotons of the rest of the iterstors
        // (if there are any), that are to the right of the incremented one,
        // to form next combination

        while(++i < combination_size)
        {
            current_combination[i] = current_combination[i - 1u];
            ++current_combination[i];
        }
        // Below is the ugly side of using the sentinel. Well it had to haave some 
        // disadvantage. Try without it.
        result.push_back(std::vector<Fci>(current_combination.begin(),
                                          current_combination.end() - 1));
    }
}

算法:

从1数到2^n。 将每个数字转换为二进制表示。 根据位置，将每个“on”位转换为集合中的元素。

在c#中:

void Main()
{
    var set = new [] {"A", "B", "C", "D" }; //, "E", "F", "G", "H", "I", "J" };

    var kElement = 2;

    for(var i = 1; i < Math.Pow(2, set.Length); i++) {
        var result = Convert.ToString(i, 2).PadLeft(set.Length, '0');
        var cnt = Regex.Matches(Regex.Escape(result),  "1").Count; 
        if (cnt == kElement) {
            for(int j = 0; j < set.Length; j++)
                if ( Char.GetNumericValue(result[j]) == 1)
                    Console.Write(set[j]);
            Console.WriteLine();
        }
    }
}

为什么它能起作用?

在n元素集的子集和n位序列之间存在双射。

这意味着我们可以通过数数序列来计算出有多少个子集。

例如，下面的四个元素集可以用{0,1}X {0,1} X {0,1} X{0,1}(或2^4)个不同的序列表示。

我们要做的就是从1数到2^n来找到所有的组合。(我们忽略空集。)接下来，将数字转换为二进制表示。然后将集合中的元素替换为“on”位。

如果只需要k个元素的结果，则只在k位为“on”时打印。

(如果你想要所有的子集，而不是k长度的子集，删除cnt/kElement部分。)

(有关证明，请参阅麻省理工学院免费课件计算机科学数学，雷曼等，第11.2.2节。https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/electrical -工程-和-计算机- science/6 - 042 j -数学- -计算机科学-下降- 2010/readings/)