Problema Solution

There are 10 books but only 7 will fit on the shelf. How many different ways can you choose and arrange 7 of them on your shelf?

Answer provided by our tutors

Here we are dealing with permutations.


A permutation is an ordered arrangement. The number of ordered arrangements of r objects taken from n unlike objects is:


nPr = n! / (n – r)!


where by definition n! = 1*2*3*....*(n-1)*n


in our case we have n = 10 and r = 7


10P7 = 10!/(10 -7)! = 10!/3! = 2*3*4*5*6*7*8*9*10/(2*3) = 4*5*6*7*8*9*10 = 604,800


there are 604,800 ways to arrange 7 books out of 10 on the shelf.