N-Queens

The n-queens puzzle is the problem of placing n queens on an n×n chessboard such that no two queens attack each other.

Given an integer n, return all distinct solutions to the n-queens puzzle.

Each solution contains a distinct board configuration of the n-queens' placement, where 'Q' and '.' both indicate a queen and an empty space respectively.

For example,
There exist two distinct solutions to the 4-queens puzzle:

[
 [".Q..",  // Solution 1
  "...Q",
  "Q...",
  "..Q."],

 ["..Q.",  // Solution 2
  "Q...",
  "...Q",
  ".Q.."]
]

Have you been asked this question in an interview?

思路： 用back trace 其实就是DFS 的一种。 Using a integer array to storage the column number of each row. Every time we want to place a queen, we need to see whether it is safe.

易错点： 判断safe 时候， 插入solution 到 result 时候。

public class Solution {
    public List<String[]> solveNQueens(int n) {
        List<String[]> ret = new ArrayList<String[]>();
        int[] col = new int[n];
        placeQueen(n, 0, col, ret);
        return ret;
    }
    
    private void placeQueen(int n, int cur, int[] col, List<String[]> ret){
        if(cur == n){
            String[] sol = new String[n];
            for(int i = 0; i < n; i++){
                StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();
                for(int j = 0; j < n; j++){
                    if(col[i] == j){
                        sb.append('Q');
                    }else{
                        sb.append('.');
                    }
                }
                sol[i] = sb.toString();
            }
            ret.add(sol);
            return;
        }
        
        for(int i = 0; i < n; i++){
            if(isSafe(cur, i, col)){
                col[cur] = i;
                placeQueen(n, cur + 1, col, ret);
            }
        }
    }
    
    private boolean isSafe(int row, int col, int[] buf){
        for(int i = 0; i < row; i++){
            if(col == buf[i] || row + col == i + buf[i] || row - col == i - buf[i])
                return false;
        }
        return true;
    }
}