假设你的字母数组是这样的:"ABCDEFGH"。你有三个下标(i, j, k)来表示你要用哪个字母来表示当前单词。

A B C D E F G H
^ ^ ^
i j k

首先你改变k，所以下一步看起来像这样:

A B C D E F G H
^ ^   ^
i j   k

如果你到达终点，你继续改变j和k。

A B C D E F G H
^   ^ ^
i   j k

A B C D E F G H
^   ^   ^
i   j   k

一旦j达到G, i也开始变化。

A B C D E F G H
  ^ ^ ^
  i j k

A B C D E F G H
  ^ ^   ^
  i j   k
...

用代码写出来是这样的

void print_combinations(const char *string)
{
    int i, j, k;
    int len = strlen(string);

    for (i = 0; i < len - 2; i++)
    {
        for (j = i + 1; j < len - 1; j++)
        {
            for (k = j + 1; k < len; k++)
                printf("%c%c%c\n", string[i], string[j], string[k]);
        }
    }
}

我已经编写了一个类来处理处理二项式系数的常见函数，这是您的问题属于的问题类型。它执行以下任务:

Outputs all the K-indexes in a nice format for any N choose K to a file. The K-indexes can be substituted with more descriptive strings or letters. This method makes solving this type of problem quite trivial. Converts the K-indexes to the proper index of an entry in the sorted binomial coefficient table. This technique is much faster than older published techniques that rely on iteration. It does this by using a mathematical property inherent in Pascal's Triangle. My paper talks about this. I believe I am the first to discover and publish this technique, but I could be wrong. Converts the index in a sorted binomial coefficient table to the corresponding K-indexes. Uses Mark Dominus method to calculate the binomial coefficient, which is much less likely to overflow and works with larger numbers. The class is written in .NET C# and provides a way to manage the objects related to the problem (if any) by using a generic list. The constructor of this class takes a bool value called InitTable that when true will create a generic list to hold the objects to be managed. If this value is false, then it will not create the table. The table does not need to be created in order to perform the 4 above methods. Accessor methods are provided to access the table. There is an associated test class which shows how to use the class and its methods. It has been extensively tested with 2 cases and there are no known bugs.

要了解这个类并下载代码，请参见将二项式系数表化。

将这个类转换为c++应该不难。

这里你有一个用c#编写的该算法的惰性评估版本:

    static bool nextCombination(int[] num, int n, int k)
    {
        bool finished, changed;

        changed = finished = false;

        if (k > 0)
        {
            for (int i = k - 1; !finished && !changed; i--)
            {
                if (num[i] < (n - 1) - (k - 1) + i)
                {
                    num[i]++;
                    if (i < k - 1)
                    {
                        for (int j = i + 1; j < k; j++)
                        {
                            num[j] = num[j - 1] + 1;
                        }
                    }
                    changed = true;
                }
                finished = (i == 0);
            }
        }

        return changed;
    }

    static IEnumerable Combinations<T>(IEnumerable<T> elements, int k)
    {
        T[] elem = elements.ToArray();
        int size = elem.Length;

        if (k <= size)
        {
            int[] numbers = new int[k];
            for (int i = 0; i < k; i++)
            {
                numbers[i] = i;
            }

            do
            {
                yield return numbers.Select(n => elem[n]);
            }
            while (nextCombination(numbers, size, k));
        }
    }

及测试部分:

    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        int k = 3;
        var t = new[] { "dog", "cat", "mouse", "zebra"};

        foreach (IEnumerable<string> i in Combinations(t, k))
        {
            Console.WriteLine(string.Join(",", i));
        }
    }

希望这对你有帮助!

另一种版本，迫使所有前k个组合首先出现，然后是所有前k+1个组合，然后是所有前k+2个组合，等等。这意味着如果你对数组进行排序，最重要的在最上面，它会把它们逐渐扩展到下一个——只有在必须这样做的时候。

private static bool NextCombinationFirstsAlwaysFirst(int[] num, int n, int k)
{
    if (k > 1 && NextCombinationFirstsAlwaysFirst(num, num[k - 1], k - 1))
        return true;

    if (num[k - 1] + 1 == n)
        return false;

    ++num[k - 1];
    for (int i = 0; i < k - 1; ++i)
        num[i] = i;

    return true;
}

例如，如果你在k=3, n=5上运行第一个方法("nextCombination")，你会得到:

0 1 2
0 1 3
0 1 4
0 2 3
0 2 4
0 3 4
1 2 3
1 2 4
1 3 4
2 3 4

但如果你跑

int[] nums = new int[k];
for (int i = 0; i < k; ++i)
    nums[i] = i;
do
{
    Console.WriteLine(string.Join(" ", nums));
}
while (NextCombinationFirstsAlwaysFirst(nums, n, k));

你会得到这个(为了清晰起见，我添加了空行):

0 1 2

0 1 3
0 2 3
1 2 3

0 1 4
0 2 4
1 2 4
0 3 4
1 3 4
2 3 4

它只在必须添加时才添加“4”，而且在添加“4”之后，它只在必须添加时再添加“3”(在执行01、02、12之后)。

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。

作为迭代器对象实现的MetaTrader MQL4非常快速的组合。

代码很容易理解。

我对很多算法进行了基准测试，这个算法真的非常快——大约比大多数next_combination()函数快3倍。

class CombinationsIterator { private: int input_array[]; // 1 2 3 4 5 int index_array[]; // i j k int m_elements; // N int m_indices; // K public: CombinationsIterator(int &src_data[], int k) { m_indices = k; m_elements = ArraySize(src_data); ArrayCopy(input_array, src_data); ArrayResize(index_array, m_indices); // create initial combination (0..k-1) for (int i = 0; i < m_indices; i++) { index_array[i] = i; } } // https://stackoverflow.com/questions/5076695 // bool next_combination(int &item[], int k, int N) bool advance() { int N = m_elements; for (int i = m_indices - 1; i >= 0; --i) { if (index_array[i] < --N) { ++index_array[i]; for (int j = i + 1; j < m_indices; ++j) { index_array[j] = index_array[j - 1] + 1; } return true; } } return false; } void getItems(int &items[]) { // fill items[] from input array for (int i = 0; i < m_indices; i++) { items[i] = input_array[index_array[i]]; } } };

测试上述迭代器类的驱动程序:

//+------------------------------------------------------------------+ //| | //+------------------------------------------------------------------+ // driver program to test above class #define N 5 #define K 3 void OnStart() { int myset[N] = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5}; int items[K]; CombinationsIterator comboIt(myset, K); do { comboIt.getItems(items); printf("%s", ArrayToString(items)); } while (comboIt.advance()); }

输出: 1 2 3 1 2 4 1 2 5 1 3 4 1 3 5 1 4 5 2 3 4 2 3 5 2 4 5 3 4 5

遵循Haskell代码同时计算组合数和组合，由于Haskell的惰性，您可以得到其中的一部分而无需计算另一部分。

import Data.Semigroup
import Data.Monoid

data Comb = MkComb {count :: Int, combinations :: [[Int]]} deriving (Show, Eq, Ord)

instance Semigroup Comb where
    (MkComb c1 cs1) <> (MkComb c2 cs2) = MkComb (c1 + c2) (cs1 ++ cs2)

instance Monoid Comb where
    mempty = MkComb 0 []

addElem :: Comb -> Int -> Comb
addElem (MkComb c cs) x = MkComb c (map (x :) cs)

comb :: Int -> Int -> Comb
comb n k | n < 0 || k < 0 = error "error in `comb n k`, n and k should be natural number"
comb n k | k == 0 || k == n = MkComb 1 [(take k [k-1,k-2..0])]
comb n k | n < k = mempty
comb n k = comb (n-1) k <> (comb (n-1) (k-1) `addElem` (n-1))

它是这样工作的:

*Main> comb 0 1
MkComb {count = 0, combinations = []}

*Main> comb 0 0
MkComb {count = 1, combinations = [[]]}

*Main> comb 1 1
MkComb {count = 1, combinations = [[0]]}

*Main> comb 4 2
MkComb {count = 6, combinations = [[1,0],[2,0],[2,1],[3,0],[3,1],[3,2]]}

*Main> count (comb 10 5)
252