Question

I’m stuck on how to begin coding this.
I want to be able to do the following. It’s a classic flipping the coin problem
If I flip twice the out comes are:

T T

T F

F T

F F

I want to be able to create an array with one result at a time. To better illustrate this, it should be something like (I’m using Java by the way):
boolean[] cases = new boolean[numberOfFlips]

the first time cases will have: T T.

After I’m done doing other calculations with this result I want to move on and now make cases: T F and proceed with running other calculations.
Can someone guide me in the right direction please? I would greatly appreciate it.
An algorithm in any language is fine with me. Thank you for your time! (:

Answer 1

There are many ways to store binary data in Java and it is unclear, what you want to store. If you want to store ALL possible combinations of N flippings, then you need and array new boolean[2^N][N]

Remember that Java has another syntax for raising to power.

UPDATE

Below is the code for storing all combinations of N flips.

From it you will get an idea how to generate one combination too: from binary representation of combination ordinal number. See comments.

    // number of flips
    // limit it by 31
    int N = 3;

    // number of combinations
    // using bitshift to power 2
    int NN = 1<<N;

    // array to store combinations
    boolean flips[][] = new boolean[NN][N];

    // generating an array
    // enumerating combinations
    for(int nn=0; nn<NN; ++nn) {

        // enumerating flips
        for( int n=0; n<N; ++n) {

            // using the fact that binary nn number representation
            // is what we need
            // using bitwise functions to get appropriate bit
            // and converting it to boolean with ==
            flips[nn][N-n-1] = (((nn>>n) & 1)==1);

            // this is simpler bu reversed
            //flips[nn][n] = (((nn>>n) & 1)==1);

        }

    }

    // printing an array
    for(int nn=0; nn<NN; ++nn) {

        System.out.print("" + nn + ": ");

        for( int n=0; n<N; ++n) {
            System.out.print(flips[nn][n]?"T ":"F ");
        }
        System.out.println("");
    }