Walking through multidimensional space in a proper way - multidimensional-array

Question

Assuming I have a vector of say four dimensions in which every variable lays in a special interval. Thus we got:
Vector k = (x1,x2,x3,x4) with x1 = (-2,2), x2 = (0,2), x3 = (-4,1), x4 = (-1,1)
I am only interested in the points constraint by the intervals.
So to say v1 = (0,1,2,0) is important where v2 = (-5,-5,5,5) is not.
In additon to that the point i+1 should be relatively close to point i among my journey. Therefore I dont want to jump around in space.
Is there a proper way of walking through those interesting points?
For example in 2D space with x1,x2 = (-2,2) like so:
Note: The frequenz of the red line could be higher

Answer 1

There are many ways to create a space-filling curve while preserving closeness. See the Wikipedia article for a few examples (some have associated algorithms for generating them): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-filling_curve
Regardless, let's work with your zig-zag pattern for 2D and work on extending it to 3D and 4D. To extend it into 3D, we just add another zig to the zig-zag. Take a look at the (rough) diagram below:
Essentially, we repeat the pattern that we had in 2D but we now have multiple layers that represent the third dimension. The extra zig that we need to add is the switch between bottom-to-top and top-to-bottom every layer. This is pretty simple to abstract:
In 2D, we have x and y axes.
We move across the x domain switching between positive and negative
directions most frequently.
We move across the y domain once.
In 3D, we have x, y, and z axes.
We move across the x domain switching between positive and negative directions most frequently.
We move across the y domain switching between positive and negative directions second most frequently.
We move across the z domain once.
It should be clear how this generalizes to higher dimensions. Now, I'll present some (Python 3) code that implements the zig-zag pattern for 4D. Let's represent the position in 4D space as (x, y, z, w) and the ranges in each dimension as (x0, x1), (y0, y1), (z0, z1), (w0, w1). These are our inputs. Then, we also define xdir, ydir, and zdir to keep track of the direction of the zig-zag.
x, y, z, w = x0, y0, z0, w0
xdir, ydir, zdir = +1, +1, +1
for iw in range(w1 - w0):
for iz in range(z1 - z0):
for iy in range(y1 - y0):
for ix in range(x1 - x0):
print(x, y, z, w)
x = x + xdir
xdir = -xdir
print(x, y, z, w)
y = y + ydir
ydir = -ydir
print(x, y, z, w)
z = z + zdir
zdir = -zdir
print(x, y, z, w)
w = w + 1
This algorithm has the guarantee that no two points printed out after each other have a distance greater than 1.
Using recursion, you can clean this up to make a very nice generalizable method. I hope this helps; let me know if you have any questions.

Answer 2

With the work of #Matthew Miller I implemented this generalization for any given multidimenisonal space:
'''assuming that we take three points out of our intervals [0,2] for a,b,c
which every one of them is corresponding to one dimension i.e. a 3D-space'''
a = [0,1,2]
b = [0,1,2]
c = [0,1,2]
vec_in = []
vec_in.append(a)
vec_in.append(b)
vec_in.append(c)
result = []
hold = []
dir = [False] * len(vec_in)
def create_points(vec , index, temp, desc):
if (desc):
loop_x = len(vec[index])-1
loop_y = -1
loop_z = -1
else:
loop_x = 0
loop_y = len(vec[index])
loop_z = 1
for i in range(loop_x,loop_y,loop_z):
temp.append(vec[index][i])
if (index < (len(vec) - 1)):
create_points(vec, index + 1, temp, dir[index])
else:
u = []
for k in temp:
u.append(k)
result.append(u)
temp.pop()
if (dir[index] == False):
dir[index] = True
else:
dir[index] = False
if len(temp) != 0:
temp.pop()
#render
create_points(vec_in, 0, hold, dir[0])
for x in (result):
print(x)
The result is a journey which covers every possible postion in a continous way:
[0, 0, 0]
[0, 0, 1]
[0, 0, 2]
[0, 1, 2]
[0, 1, 1]
[0, 1, 0]
[0, 2, 0]
[0, 2, 1]
[0, 2, 2]
[1, 2, 2]
[1, 2, 1]
[1, 2, 0]
[1, 1, 0]
[1, 1, 1]
[1, 1, 2]
[1, 0, 2]
[1, 0, 1]
[1, 0, 0]
[2, 0, 0]
[2, 0, 1]
[2, 0, 2]
[2, 1, 2]
[2, 1, 1]
[2, 1, 0]
[2, 2, 0]
[2, 2, 1]
[2, 2, 2]