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Howto create combinations of several vectors without hardcoding loops in C++?

Asked 2009-11-09T09:58:48.087
17

I have several data that looks like this:

Vector1_elements = T,C,A
Vector2_elements = C,G,A
Vector3_elements = C,G,T
..... up to ...
VectorK_elements = ...

#Note also that the member of each vector is always 3.

What I want to do is to create all combination of elements in Vector1 through out VectorK. Hence in the end we hope to get this output (using Vector1,2,3):

TCC
TCG
TCT
TGC
TGG
TGT
TAC
TAG
TAT
CCC
CCG
CCT
CGC
CGG
CGT
CAC
CAG
CAT
ACC
ACG
ACT
AGC
AGG
AGT
AAC
AAG
AAT

The problem I am having now is that the following code of mine does that by hardcoding the loops. Since number of Vectors can be varied, we need a flexible way to get the same result. Is there any?

This code of mine can only handle up to 3 Vectors (hardcoded):

#include <iostream>
#include <vector>
#include <fstream>
#include <sstream>
using namespace std;


int main  ( int arg_count, char *arg_vec[] ) {

    vector <string> Vec1;
          Vec1.push_back("T");
          Vec1.push_back("C");
          Vec1.push_back("A");

    vector <string> Vec2;
          Vec2.push_back("C");
          Vec2.push_back("G");
          Vec2.push_back("A");

    vector <string> Vec3;
          Vec3.push_back("C");
          Vec3.push_back("G");
          Vec3.push_back("T");



     for (int i=0; i<Vec1.size(); i++) {
        for (int j=0; j<Vec2.size(); j++) {
            for (int k=0; k<Vec1.size(); k++) {
                cout << Vec1[i] << Vec2[i] << Vec3[k] << endl;
            }
        }
     }



    return 0;
}
c++ algorithm vector combinations cartesian-product
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1 Answer

5

A C++0x solution. Provided, of course, your compiled supports it (currently GCC 4.5 and VS2010, I think).

The following compiles and works with GCC 4.5 using -std=c++0x switch. The use of variadic templates makes it possible to combine arbitrary number of containers. I am sure you can come up with a more idiomatic solution.

#include <vector>       
#include <string>
#include <sstream>
#include <iostream>
#include <algorithm>

typedef std::vector<std::string> myvec;

// Base case.
void combine2(const std::string &row) {
    std::cout << row << std::endl;
}

// Recursive variadic template core function.
template<class T0, class ...T>
void combine2(const std::string &row, const T0& cont0, T...cont_rest) {
    for (auto i = cont0.begin(); i != cont0.end(); ++i) {
        std::stringstream ss;
        ss << row << *i;
        combine2(ss.str(), cont_rest...);
    }
}

// The actual function to call.
template<class ...T>
void combine(T...containers) {
    combine2("", containers...);
}

int main() {
    myvec v1 = {"T", "C", "A"}, v2 = {"C", "G", "A"}, v3 = {"C", "G", "T"};

    combine(v1);
    combine(v1, v2);
    combine(v1, v2, v3);

    // Or even...
    std::vector<std::string> v4 = {"T", "C", "A"};
    std::vector<char> v5 = {'C', 'G', 'A'};
    std::vector<int> v6 = {1 ,2 ,3};

    combine(v4);
    combine(v4, v5);
    combine(v4, v5, v6);

    return 0;
}
answered 2009-11-09T10:41:57.933

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