The Comb package contains functions for combinatorics, such as permutations/1 and combinations/2. Functions returning large lists will return these as a stream, while smaller values may be any enumerable.

The package contains only Elixir code without any library dependencies.

Where applicable, the library will return sensible results with repeated parameters. This is best shown in the examples section.

    iex> permutations(1..3) |> Enum.to_list
    [[1, 2, 3], [2, 1, 3], [1, 3, 2], [3, 1, 2], [2, 3, 1], [3, 2, 1]]

    iex> permutations([1, 1, 2]) |> Enum.to_list
    [[1, 1, 2], [1, 2, 1], [2, 1, 1]]

    iex> permutation_index([1, 3, 2])
    2

    iex> drop_permutations(1..3, 3) |> Enum.to_list
    [[3, 1, 2], [2, 3, 1], [3, 2, 1]]

    iex> nth_permutation(1..3, 3)
    [3, 1, 2]

    iex> combinations(1..3, 2) |> Enum.to_list
    [[1, 2], [1, 3], [2, 3]]

    iex> combinations([1, 1, 2, 2], 3) |> Enum.to_list
    [[1, 1, 2], [1, 2, 2]]

    iex> nth_combination(1..4, 2, 5)
    [3, 4]

    iex> count_combinations(1..3, 2)
    3

    iex> cartesian_product(1..2, 3..4)
    [[1, 3], [1, 4], [2, 3], [2, 4]]

    iex> subsets(1..3) |> Enum.to_list
    [[], [1], [2], [3], [1, 2], [1, 3], [2, 3], [1, 2, 3]]

    iex> subsets([1, 1, 2]) |> Enum.to_list
    [[], [1], [2], [1, 1], [1, 2], [1, 1, 2]]

    iex> count_subsets(1..3)
    8

    iex> selections(1..2, 3) |> Enum.to_list
    [[1, 1, 1], [1, 1, 2], [1, 2, 1], [1, 2, 2], [2, 1, 1], [2, 1, 2],
    [2, 2, 1], [2, 2, 2]]

    iex> partitions(1..3) |> Enum.to_list
    [[[1, 2, 3]], [[1, 2], [3]], [[1, 3], [2]], [[1], [2, 3]], [[1], [2], [3]]]

    iex> partitions([1, 1, 2]) |> Enum.to_list
    [[[1, 1, 2]], [[1, 1], [2]], [[1], [1, 2]], [[1], [1], [2]]]

As of now, some functions are optimized while others are not. We are inviting anyone with spare time and an interest to try to optimize any of these functions. If there is some performance gain, and tests are still passing, pull requests will be considered on Github.

As the package is gradually optimized, we will strive to keep the interface fixed. Even so, you should not depend on a certain function generating the exact same sequence between versions of this package. For example, the permutation/1 function may return the different permutations in different orders depending on the algorithm used. This will extend to functions like nth_permutation/2 that could return different values between versions.

The interface of the module is more or less compatible with the clojure math.combinatorics package, which seemed well thought out.

The package is licenced under Apache 2.0, so if you want to copy code from other libraries, please make sure that the license of the source will allow this. Note that the Clojure library mentioned above is licenced more restrictive than this package. Any source contributed is assumed to be free of patents and released under the same license as the rest of the code. Please also refer to the LICENSE file.

To measure a revised algorithm, we have supplied a mix task to measure the speedup compared to a naive (non streamed) version of the algorithm.

    $ mix benchmark

Testing permutation
-- naive
*** #Function<1.110413037/0 in Mix.Tasks.Benchmark.run/1> ***
1.5 sec     15 iterations   102477.34 μs/op

-- SJT
*** #Function<2.110413037/0 in Mix.Tasks.Benchmark.run/1> ***
2.1 sec      7 iterations   312474.58 μs/op

-- LazyPermutations
*** #Function<3.110413037/0 in Mix.Tasks.Benchmark.run/1> ***
2.2 sec      7 iterations   318748.15 μs/op

-- Table
*** #Function<4.110413037/0 in Mix.Tasks.Benchmark.run/1> ***
1.7 sec     31 iterations   55273.88 μs/op

-- Table stream
*** #Function<5.110413037/0 in Mix.Tasks.Benchmark.run/1> ***
1.3 sec     31 iterations   42615.81 μs/op

Testing combination
-- Wless1 Optimized
*** #Function<6.110413037/0 in Mix.Tasks.Benchmark.run/1> ***
1.4 sec    32K iterations   43.37 μs/op

-- Wless1 Naive
*** #Function<7.110413037/0 in Mix.Tasks.Benchmark.run/1> ***
1.4 sec    16K iterations   88.61 μs/op

• Martin Svalin / @martinsvalin: Original LazyPermutations module
• Tommy Fisher / @wless1 on Slack: Original combinations and combinations2
• Tallak Tveide / @tallakt: Other stuff