Question

The total number of different combinations of one or more letters which can be made from the letters of the word ${}^{\prime }MISSISSIPP{I}^{\prime }$ is

• A. $150$
• B. $148$
• C. $149$
• D. None of these

Answer 1

The correct option is C $149$

Frequency of respective letters:

$M-1$

$I-4$

$S-4$

$P-2$

Now the words that we will make may have M or it may not have M giving us 2 options

Similarly the word may have one, two, three , four or no I's giving us 5 options.

The same goes for S giving us 5 options whil for P we shall have 3 options.

We must not forget to exclude that case where no letter is picked up.

No. of combinations = $2\times 5\times 5\times 3-1=149$