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Algorithm to find the number of distinct paths in a directed graph [duplicate]

Possible Duplicate:
Graph Algorithm To Find All Connections Between Two Arbitrary Vertices

I have a directed graph, what algorithm can i use to find the number of distinct acyclic paths between 2 particular vertices, and count the maximum times any path is used in these distinct paths? Two paths are distinct if they either visit a different number of vertices or visit vertices in a different order.

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Pranav Avatar asked Oct 29 '09 07:10

Pranav


1 Answers

If you follow a slightly modified Dijkstra's algorithm, you can have an all-pair solution.

Explanation: Paths from u to v is the sum of the following:

  1. Paths from u to v which doesn't pass through w
  2. Paths which go through w = number of paths from u to w times number of paths from w to v

Initialise the matrix with zeros except when there is an edge from i to j (which is 1). Then the following algorithm will give you the result (all-pair-path-count)

for i = 1 to n:
    for j = 1 to n:
        for k = 1 to n:
            paths[i][i] += paths[i][k] * paths[k][j]

Needless to say : O(n^3)

Eager to read a single pair solution. :)

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ThisIsMeMoony Avatar answered Oct 11 '22 16:10

ThisIsMeMoony