Permutations and

Combinations
 Permutation
 A permutation is an arrangement of the
objects in a definite order.

 For example, 3 blocks can be ordered 6 ways

 There are n! permutations of n elements

 Easily proved using the Product rule
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 r-Permutation
 r-permutations are used to order subsets of distinct
elements
 P(n,r) represents the r-permutations of a set of n distinct
elements
 P(n,r) = n(n-1)(n-2) … (n-r+1) for r  n
 P(n,r) = n! / (n-r)!

 Example
 There are 8 different candy to choose from. How many
different “meals” can you make by choosing 3 of them?
 P(n,r) = P(8,3) = 8*7*6

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 Permutations mainly occur where a
rearrangement within a particular group would
change its nature into a different selection.
 Example: A group of people chosen to be
president , Vice-President, Secretary, and
Treasurer constitutes a different leadership
group with each reassignment of titles within
the particular subgroup.

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 r-Combination

What if it does not matter which order you eat

the candy?...
 A combination is an unordered arrangement
of elements in a set
 Example: a 3-combination from a set of 12 colored
blocks

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 r-Combination

 An r-combination is a selection of r
unordered elements from a set (or simply a
subset with r elements)
 C(n,r) denotes the number of r-combinations of a
set of n elements
 C(n,r)= P(n,r)/r! = n!/[(n-r)!r!] = C(n,n-r)

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 Combinations occur in Problems regarding
card hands, committees, and other
circumstances where a rearrangement of a
particular group is still considered the same
group.
 Example: Four people sitting on a committee
can play musical chairs all day long, but it is
still the same committee of four.

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 Combinations with Repetition
 Theorem:
 There are C( n + r - 1, r) r-combinations from a set
with n unique elements when repetition of
elements is allowed.
 Previous Example:
 n = 3 different fruits
 r = 4 items to select

 C( 3+4-1, 4) = C(6,4) = 6!/[(6-4)!4!] = 15

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 Combinations with Repetition
 Example
 How many ways are there to select 3 bills from a
cash box containing $1, $5, $10, $20 and $50
bills?
 Solution
n=5
$1 $5 $10 $20 $50 r=3
C( 3+5-1, 3)
C( 7, 3)
* * *
* * *
** *
***
1 2 3 4
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 Combination with Repetition
 Example
 How many ways can 6 balls be distributed
into 9 different bins?

 Solution
 n = 9 unique bins
 r = 6 balls
 C( 9+6-1, r ) = C(14, 6)

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 Permutations with Repetition
 Counting permutations with repetition relies
on the multiplication rule
 Example:
 How many strings of length r can be formed from
the English alphabet?
abc abc abc … abc = 26*26*26 … 26 = 26r

 Theorem: r r
 The number of r-permutations of a set of n objects
with repetition is n r

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 There are 4 candidates for the post of a
lecturer in Mathematics and one is to be
selected by votes of 5 men. The number of
ways in which the votes can be given is
 Sol: Each man can vote for any one of the 4
candidates and this can be done in 4 ways.
 5 men can vote in 45 = 1024 ways.

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 r-Permutations with Repetition
 Theorem
 The number of different permutations of n objects,
where there are n1 identical objects of type 1, n2
identical objects of type 2 … and nt identical
objects of type t, is
n!
n1! n2! …nt!

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 Example: Which formula to use???
How many different strings can be made by reordering
the letters of the string SUCCESS?
Solution: 7!
3! X 2!X1!X1!
= 420

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 Permutations & Combinations
For r elements selected from n distinct elements:

r-permutations n! r-combinations n!
P(n,r) (n-r)! C(n,r) (n-r)!r!

r-permutations nr
with repetition

For n elements with n1, n2 … nt For n unique elements in X with

identical objects r selections from X
permutations
n! combinations
with repetition of C(n+r-1,r)
identical objects n1!n2! …nt! with repetition
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