Leetcode 51. N-Queens

public class Solution {
    public static boolean canPlace(int row, int col, List<Integer> loc) {
        // new Queen is at column of some other Queen which is not a valid position,
        // make sure that there is no duplicate in the loc list
        if (loc.contains(col)) return false;
        
        // new Queen is at the diagonal of some other Queen,
        // if |i - j| == |loc[i] - loc[j]| means tow Queens are at same diagonal
        for (int i=0; i<loc.size(); i++)
            if (Math.abs(i - loc.size()) == Math.abs(loc.get(i) - col))
                return false;
        
        return true;
    }
    
    public static void nQueens(int n, int row, List<Integer> loc, List<String> list, List<List<String>> ret) {
        if (row == n) { 
            ret.add(new ArrayList<>(list));     // reaches end, add the current string list to the result
            return;
        }
        else {
            for (int col=0; col<n; col++) {      // search from column 0 to column n-1 for a given row
                if (canPlace(row, col, loc)) {
                    loc.add(col);
                    char[] tmp = new char[n];
                    Arrays.fill(tmp, '.');
                    tmp[col] = 'Q';
                    String tmpString = new String(tmp);
                    list.add(tmpString);
                    
                    nQueens(n, row+1, loc, list, ret);      // move to the next row
                    
                    list.remove(list.size()-1);
                    loc.remove(loc.size()-1);
                }
            }
        }
    }
    
    public List<List<String>> solveNQueens(int n) {
        List<List<String>> ret = new ArrayList<>();
        nQueens(n, 0, new ArrayList<Integer>(), new ArrayList<String>(), ret);
        //System.out.println(cnt);
        return ret;
    }
}