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PROJECT EULER · #0106

Special Subset Sums: Meta-testing

Statement only · SolvedOriginal problem ↗

Let S(A) represent the sum of elements in set A of size n. We shall call it a special sum set if for any two non-empty disjoint subsets, B and C, the following properties are true:

  1. S(B)S(C); that is, sums of subsets cannot be equal.
  2. If B contains more elements than C then S(B)>S(C).

For this problem we shall assume that a given set contains n strictly increasing elements and it already satisfies the second rule.

Surprisingly, out of the 25 possible subset pairs that can be obtained from a set for which n=4, only 1 of these pairs need to be tested for equality (first rule). Similarly, when n=7, only 70 out of the 966 subset pairs need to be tested.

For n=12, how many of the 261625 subset pairs that can be obtained need to be tested for equality?

NOTE: This problem is related to Problem 103 and Problem 105.

Write-up coming later

The complete problem is available here. An approach, code, and answer will be added later.