TITLE: Number of $k$-dimensional subspaces in $V$
QUESTION [6 upvotes]: I know my following question is somewhat similar to this one but still I need help .
How many $k$-dimensional subspaces of a $n$-dimensional vector space $V$  over the finite field $F$ with $q$ elements are there?

REPLY [13 votes]: Let me try to answer your question:
Let us first look at the case of one-dimensional subspaces: Every one-dimensional subspace is spanned by non-zero vector, which there are $q^n-1$ many of. Two of these vectors span the same subspace if and only if they are non-zero scalar multiples of each other; we have $q-1$ such scalars. Thus we have $\frac{q^n-1}{q-1}$ one-dimensional subspaces.
Simlilary we can count the number of $k$-dimensional subspaces for $0 \leq k \leq n$. We will need the following formula:

Proposition Let $W$ be an $n$-dimensional vector space over $\mathbb{F}_q$, the finite field with $q$ elements, and let $0 \leq k \leq n$. Then there exist
  $$
 \frac{(q^n-1)(q^n-q)(q^n-q^2) \dotsm (q^n-q^{k-1})}{k!}
$$
  many linearly independent subsets of $W$ consisting of $k$ elements.
Proof: We first figure out the number of linearly independent families of $k$ elements: For the first member $b_1$ we can pick any non-zero vector, so we have $q^n-1$ choices. For the second member $b_2$ we can take any vector not in the span of $b_1$. So we have $q^n-q$ choices for $b_2$. Continuing this we can pick $b_i$ arbitrarily outside of the span of the previous members $b_1, \dotsc, b_{i-1}$, so we have $q^n - q^i$ choices for $b_i$. Thus we find that we have
  $$
 (q^n-1)(q^n-q)(q^n-q^2) \dotsm (q^n-q^{k-1})
$$
  many linearly independent families $(b_1, \dotsc, b_k)$.
  Two of these families represent the same linearly indendent subset if and only if they are the same up to reorderding of its members. Because there are $k!$ such reorderings we have
  $$
 \frac{(q^n-1)(q^n-q)(q^n-q^2) \dotsm (q^n-q^{k-1})}{k!}
$$
  many linearly indepndent subsets consisting of $k$ elements.

We know that every $k$-dimensional subspace of $V$ is spanned by $k$ linearly indendent vectors of $V$. So by the above proposition we have at most
$$
 \frac{(q^n-1)(q^n-q)(q^n-q^2) \dotsm (q^n-q^{k-1})}{k!}
$$
$k$-dimensional subspaces.
Now the same subspace $U$ is spanned by many different linearly independent subsets, say $L$ many. These $L$ subsets are precisely the bases of $U$. By we above formula we know that there are
$$
 \frac{(q^k-1)(q^k-q) \dotsm (q^k-q^{k-1})}{k!}
$$
many such bases.
Putting this together we find that there are
$$
 \frac{
  \left( \frac{(q^n-1)(q^n-q)(q^n-q^2) \dotsm (q^n-q^{k-1})}{k!} \right)
 }{
  \left( \frac{(q^k-1)(q^k-q)(q^k-q^2) \dotsm (q^k-q^{k-1})}{k!} \right)
 }
 = \frac{
    (q^n-1)(q^n-q) \dotsm (q^n-q^{k-1})
    }{
    (q^k-1)(q^k-q) \dotsm (q^k-q^{k-1})
    }
$$
many different $k$-dimensional subspaces.