Hello there! Brace yourself as we dive into a tantalizing problem that involves array manipulation, combinatorial logic, and some Ruby mastery. This problem centers around finding combinations in a given array whose sum is equivalent to a specified target value. Are you ready for a thrilling endeavor? Great! Let's jump into the world of Ruby and number theory.
Here's the task at hand: You have to write a Ruby method that accepts an array of distinct integers and a target sum as input. The aim is to identify exactly four numbers in the array that, when summed, equal this target. Should there be multiple sets that meet this condition, your method should return any one of them. If no such quad exists, the method should return an empty array.
Consider this array as an example: [5, 15, 2, 7, 8, 4]. If your target sum is 24, a four-number set that adds up to this value could be [5, 7, 4, 8].
The input array will contain at least 4 and at most 1000 distinct integers. The input integers will be in the range of to . The target sum will also be in the range of to . There is a time limit for the solution to evaluate within 3 seconds.
