How to generate combinations from a set of objects?

Question

I need to get all possible combinations of 5 objects from set of 7 objects. Combinations without repetition (the order of selection does not matter, that's the same objects selected in different orders are regarded as the same combination).

I have implementation, it works properly and produces the correct result:

String[] vegetablesSet = {"Pepper", "Cabbage", "Tomato", "Carrot", "Beans", "Cucumber", "Peas"};
final int SALAD_COMBINATION_SIZE = 5; // Example: {"Tomato", "Cabbage", "Cucumber", "Pepper", "Carrot"} 

Set<Set<String>> allSaladCombinations = new HashSet<>();
for (int i = 1, max = 1 << vegetablesSet.length; i < max; i++) {
   Set<String> set = new HashSet<>();
   int count = 0;
   for (int j = 0, k = 1; j < vegetablesSet.length; j++, k <<= 1) {
      if ((k & i) != 0) {
         set.add(vegetablesSet[j]);
         count++;
      }
   }
   if (count == SALAD_COMBINATION_SIZE) {
      allSaladCombinations.add(set);
   }
}

for (Set<String> set : allSaladCombinations) {
   for (String vegatable : set) {
      System.out.print(vegatable + " ");
   }
   System.out.println();
}

Output is correct: 21 right combinations has been found.

But it uses a bitwise operators and in my assessment it's not very readable, maintainable and extensible. I'd like to refactor or completely rewrite it to a more flexible and understandable object oriented approach. I'm very interested in how this could be done using OOP and recursion.

I do not use in my project Google Guava, Apache Commons or CombinatoricsLib. And I'd not want to include the whole third-party library for only one method. I was searching on the site for similar issues, but have found only good clear permutation implementation: https://stackoverflow.com/a/14486955

These cases have a somewhat similar meaning, but order of objects does not matter for me, in my case they're considered the same combinations and should not be calculated.

Answer 1

You can give this code a try:

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        String[] vegetablesSet = { "Pepper", "Cabbage", "Tomato", "Carrot", "Beans", "Cucumber", "Peas" };
        Set<Set<String>> result = new HashSet<>();      
        combinations(vegetablesSet, new ArrayList<>(), result, 5, 0);
        result.forEach(System.out::println);
    }

    public static void combinations(String[] values, List<String> current, Set<Set<String>> accumulator, int size, int pos) {
        if (current.size() == size) {
            Set<String> toAdd = current.stream().collect(Collectors.toSet());
            if (accumulator.contains(toAdd)) {
                throw new RuntimeException("Duplicated value " + current);
            }
            accumulator.add(toAdd);
            return;
        }
        for (int i = pos; i <= values.length - size + current.size(); i++) {
            current.add(values[i]);
            combinations(values, current, accumulator, size, i + 1);
            current.remove(current.size() - 1);
        }
    }

The basic idea is taking only the elements from the current positition onwards and using the recursing to mix the different options.

If you want a simpler method call, you can create a wrapper method like this:

    public static Set<Set<String>> combinations(String[] values) {
        Set<Set<String>> result = new HashSet<>();
        combinations(values, new ArrayList<>(), result, SALAD_COMBINATION_SIZE, 0);
        return result;
    }

---

Edit: Another approach will be making the different permutations of ones and zeroes (5 ones and 2 zeroes in this case) to create masks that then will be converted in the combination. I feel it more natural than the previous solution, since it doesn't use loops, other than the mask application (implicit in the stream operation):

    public static void combinations2(String[] values, String current, Set<Set<String>> accumulator, int ones, int zeroes) {
        if (ones + zeroes == 0) {
            accumulator.add(IntStream.range(0, values.length)
                    .filter(position -> '1' == current.charAt(position))
                    .mapToObj(position -> values[position])
                    .collect(Collectors.toSet()));
            return;
        }
        if (ones > 0) {
            combinations2(values, current + "1", accumulator, ones - 1, zeroes);
        }
        if (zeroes > 0) {
            combinations2(values, current + "0", accumulator, ones, zeroes - 1);
        }
    }

Wrapper method:

public static Set<Set<String>> combinations(String[] values) {
        Set<Set<String>> result = new HashSet<>();
        combinations2(values, "", result, SALAD_COMBINATION_SIZE, values.length - SALAD_COMBINATION_SIZE);
        return result;
    }