How would you calculate all possible permutations of 0 through N iteratively?

Question

I need to calculate permutations iteratively. The method signature looks like:

int[][] permute(int n)

For n = 3 for example, the r

Answer 1

The algorithm for stepping from one permutation to the next is very similar to elementary school addition - when an overflow occurs, "carry the one".

Here's an implementation I wrote in C:

#include 

//Convenience macro.  Its function should be obvious.
#define swap(a,b) do { \
        typeof(a) __tmp = (a); \
        (a) = (b); \
        (b) = __tmp; \
    } while(0)

void perm_start(unsigned int n[], unsigned int count) {
    unsigned int i;
    for (i=0; i0 && n[i-1] >= n[i]; i--);
    tail = i;

    if (tail > 0) {
        /* Find the last item from the tail set greater than
            the last item from the head set, and swap them.
            Example: 0 3* (5 4* 2 1)
            Becomes: 0 4* (5 3* 2 1) */
        for (j=count-1; j>tail && n[j] <= n[tail-1]; j--);

        swap(n[tail-1], n[j]);
    }

    /* Reverse the tail set's order */
    for (i=tail, j=count-1; i