A -subset is a subset
of a set on
elements containing exactly
elements. The number of
-subsets on
elements is therefore given by the binomial
coefficient
.
For example, there are
2-subsets of
, namely
,
,
and
.
The -subsets of a list
can be enumerated in the Wolfram Language
as Subsets[list,
{k}].
Summing the numbers of distinct -subsets on a set of
elements over all sizes
,
1, ...,
gives the total number of subsets,