leetcode #51

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.."]
]

Solution:

A valid result must have one queen at each row and each column. Thus we scan by rows or columns. Within each row/column, we try put 'Q' at each valid position we find.

A valid position is a position with '.' and it would not be attacked by the queens we have put in other positions. 

To check if it could be attacked, we should check if this position is on same diagonal/anti-diagonal/row/column with other queens. 

code: 

class Solution {
public:

    
    vector<vector<string>> solveNQueens(int n) {
        vector<vector<string>> res;
        vector<int> queen_row_ind; 
        solve(n-1,n, queen_row_ind, res);//start from n-1th column to 0th column
        return res;
    }
    
    void solve(int cur_col,int n, vector<int> &queen_row_ind, vector<vector<string>> &res){
        if(cur_col < 0){
            //generate a board
            string row(n, '.');
            vector<string> board(n, row);
            for(int i = 0; i < n; i ++){
                board[queen_row_ind[n-1-i]][i] = 'Q';
            }
            res.push_back(board);
            return;
        }
        
        for(int i = 0; i < n; i ++){
            if(isValid(queen_row_ind, i, cur_col, n)){//check if we can put a queen here
                queen_row_ind.push_back(i);
                solve(cur_col-1, n,queen_row_ind, res);//moving to next column, cur_col - 1
                queen_row_ind.pop_back();
            }
        }
        
    }
    bool isValid(vector<int> &queen_row_ind, int row, int col, int n){
        for(int i = 0; i < queen_row_ind.size(); i ++){
            int temp_row = queen_row_ind[i];
            int temp_col = n-1-i;
            //check diag and anti_diag and row
            if(abs(temp_row - row) == abs(temp_col - col)|| temp_row == row) return false;

        }
        return true;
        
    }
    
};