Question: Let a and b be positive integers, with a ≤ b. A certain class has b students, and among any a of them there is always one that is friends with the other a − 1. Find all values of a and b for which there must necessarily be a student who is friends with everyone else in the class.
My thoughts are that a can be any integer greater than 1 because a student in a class of one cannot have friends, and that b must equal a, as one student must be friends with everyone and a-1 equals maximum number of friendships. Therefore there are infinites values for a and b, provided that a is greater than 1.
Is my solution correct and logical? If it isn't please explain why, thanks.
You need to observe what the question is asking: it doesn't ask how many $(a,b)$ pairs there are that satisfy this condition, it asks you to list all of those pairs. You're right that $(b,b)$ will always satisfied this condition, but for you to have the complete answer, you need to show that there are no other solutions except for $(b,b)$.
As it turns out, there are other solutions. Try $a=4$ and $b=5$. I can give a more detailed explanation if you want, but it turns out that you'll have to get somebody who is friends with everyone.
I don't know the complete solution, but I can say that yours is not complete.