Calculate the Probability of Combinations

Question

I am trying to solve this coding problem with no luck. The problem is like this: I need to create a function that receives two arguments. The first is a list that consists n number of string values. The second argument is the amount of values I want in the returned list. My challenge is to create a new list of lists with the maximum amount of combinations possible with k strings in each list. I think using an example will best explain this:

symbols = ['stop', 'bomb', 'moon']
def create_deck(symbols, k):

create_deck(symbols,2)

I expect the function to return:

[['stop', 'bomb'], ['stop', 'moon'], ['moon', 'bomb']]

which is the maximum amount of combinations while k=2. Meaning two words per list.

I dont have any code to present because the furthest I got is a mathematical equation that represents the solution:

nCr = n! / r! * (n - r)!

but no code.

Hint: You need to use two `for` loops. – Mykola Zotko Nov 28 '20 at 20:41 — Mykola Zotko, Nov 28 '20 at 20:41
Unfortunately I cannot use itertools. – Dovi Fischman Nov 28 '20 at 20:41 — Dovi Fischman, Nov 28 '20 at 20:41

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Nov 28 '20 at 20:37

0

itertools.combinations should do the trick:

import itertools
def create_deck(symbols, k):
    return [list(x) for x in itertools.combinations(symbols, k)]

answered Nov 28 '20 at 20:37

Mureinik

297,002
52
306
350

Any idea how to approach this not using itertools? Thats the challenge – Dovi Fischman Nov 28 '20 at 20:37
you have to be more specific. in principle you could use a recursive approach and pass the recursion depth as a parameter. – Marc Nov 28 '20 at 20:45

Calculate the Probability of Combinations

1 Answers1