Generate the Stack Overflow logo

Question

The challenge is to generate an image similar to the StackOverflow logo:

The output must contain:

• Image size 64*64 or greater
• A gray |__| shaped base
• A curved segmented stack coming up from the base. The segments will fade from gray to orange, and make a ~90 degree right turn. The number of segments should be between 5 and 7, with 6 being preferred.

Note: For ascii displays that lack color, use a '0' character to represent gray, and '9' for orange. '1' to '8' would represent the shades in-between.

Restrictions:

• You must generate the image. Loading images or storing them in the code/binary is not allowed.

Additional rules/information:

• The image is not required to be identical to the logo, however it must be recognizable as it.
• The method of display is up to you. Saving it to an image file or displaying on the screen are both acceptable.

Judging/winning criteria:

• Accuracy of the image is the primary condition
• Elegance of generation is the secondary condition

Answer 1

Mathematica

Graphics[{
   Gray, Rectangle[{0, 0}, {78, 50}],
   White, Rectangle[{9, 9}, {69, 50}]}
  ~Join~
  Table[{
    Blend[{Gray, Orange}, x/5],
    Rotate[
     Translate[
      Rectangle[{16, 16}, {61, 25}],
      {0.25x^3 + 0.6x^2 - 0.4x, -0.53x^3 + 3.26x^2 + 12x}],
     -0.05x^2 - 0.04x]},
   {x, 0, 5}]]

I decided to prettify my answer after realizing this isn't code golf. Whoops!

Screenshot:

In related news, I also created what I think the Stack Overflow logo might look like in... THE FUTURE:

Here's the code if anyone wants to play around with it (sorry for the mess):

Graphics3D[{EdgeForm[],
   Opacity[1],
   RGBColor[0.2, 0.2, 0.2], Cuboid[{0, 0, 0}, {78, 4, 50}],
   Cuboid[{0, 4, 0}, {4, 45, 50}],
    Cuboid[{74, 4, 0}, {78, 45, 50}],
   Opacity[1]}
  ~Join~
  Fold[Join, {},
   Table[{Hue[0.15 - i/5/12, i/3, 1],
     Translate[
      Rotate[
       Scale[Cuboid[{16, 16, 16}, {61, 25, 25}], {1, .3, .3}],
       (-.05 ((i*2 - 1.5)*1.25)^2 - .04 ((i*2)*1.2)), {0.3, 
        0.8, -1}, {(16 + 61)/2, (16 + 25)/2, (16 + 25)/2}],
      {-((i*2)^2 - (i*2)*4)/2, (i*2)^2*3/2, 0}]},
    {i, 0, 4.5, 0.05}]], Lighting -> "Neutral", Axes -> False, 
 Background -> White, Boxed -> False]

Answer 2

Javascript (650)

I wrote a quine that reads the characters in the function, and replaces non-space characters with a number from 0-9.

(function a(){
l=[
                   1,
                    1,
            11,      1,
             11,     1,
               11,    1,
       11,      11,   1,
         11,      11,
           11,
   11,       1111,
     1111,
0,       11111111, 0,
0, 11,             0,
0,   111111111111, 0,
0,                 0,
0, 11111111111111, 0,
0,                 0,
000000000000000000000]

b=a.toString().split("[")[1].split("]")[0].split(""),i=-1
document.getElementById("output").innerHTML=
b.map(function(c){
++i
if(c==" "||c=="\n")return c
if(c!=0)c=9-Math.floor((i/b.length)*10)
if(b[i-1]=="0")c=0
return"<span class='c"+c+"'>"+c+"</span>"
}).join("")
})()

This outputs this ASCII art:

                   99
                    88
            888      88
             777     77
               766    66
       666      666   66
         555      555
           555
   444       44444
     44444
00       333333333 00
00 333             00
00   2222222222222 00
00                 00
00 111111111111111 00
00                 00
000000000000000000000

which can be colored with a css stylesheet if you like

  span{
    font-weight: bold;
  }
  .c0, .c1{
    color: #222;
  }
  .c2{
    color: #765;
  }
  .c3{
    color: #976;
  }
  .c4{
    color: #A64;
  }
  .c6, .c5{
    color: #D51;
  }
  .c8, .c9, .c7{
    color: #F60;
  }

You can see it in action on jsBin.

Here is a screenshot, in case the link dies:

Answer 3

Haskell w/Gloss

import Graphics.Gloss

picture = translate 0 (-50) $ pictures [stack, base 150 60 20]

stack = translate 0 30 $ pictures [item n | n <- [0..5]]

item n = bend 200 (-10*n) $ color (fade grey orange (n/5)) box
  where box = rectangleSolid 110 20

base width height thickness = color grey $ pictures [left, right, bottom]
  where bottom = rectangleSolid width thickness
        left = translate (width / 2) (height / 2) side
        right = translate (-width / 2) (height / 2) side

        side = rectangleSolid thickness (height + thickness)

bend radius angle = translate radius 0 . rotate angle . translate (-radius) 0

fade from to alpha = mixColors (1-alpha) alpha from to

grey = greyN 0.5

Paste the code here to see it in action, or add the following line to compile it (requires Gloss).

main = display (InWindow "Stack Overflow" (512, 512) (10, 10)) white picture

Answer 4

SVG (316 characters)

Based on Sir_Lagsalot's version, with strokes instead of fills. Besides shaving off a few chars, the code is simpler and the output looks better scaled up.

<svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg">
<g stroke-width="6" fill="none">
<path stroke="grey" d="m3,51v31h47V53M10,70h33"/>
<path stroke="#a86" d="m10,57 33,3"/>
<path stroke="#b95" d="m13,42 31,9"/>
<path stroke="#c82" d="m20,25 28,17"/>
<path stroke="#e80" d="m34,9 19,27"/>
<path stroke="#f71" d="m56,1 4,32"/>
</g>
</svg>

Link to SVG image.

Rendered to PNG (at natural size and scaled up x2 and x3):

       

Answer 5

SVG (333 characters)

I've created a SVG image that generates a 67x68 version of the logo in 333 characters:

<svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg">
<path fill="grey" d="m0,53v34h53V53h-5v29H5V53M9,69h33v6H11v-6"/>
<path fill="#a86" d="m12,56 31,3-1,6-31-3"/>
<path fill="#b95" d="m15,41 31,9-2,6-31-8"/>
<path fill="#c82" d="m22,25 28,17-3,5-28-17"/>
<path fill="#e80" d="m38,8 19,27-5,4-19-27"/>
<path fill="#f71" d="m62,0 5,32-6,1-5-32"/>
</svg>

Link for small SVG image
Link for large SVG image

Answer 6

Javascript (a lot of 814 characters)

window.onload = function() {
                var canvas = document.getElementById("cgCanvas");
                var context = canvas.getContext("2d");
                context.moveTo(60,140);
                context.lineTo(60,190);
                context.moveTo(57.5,190);
                context.lineTo(137.5,190);
                context.moveTo(135,140);
                context.lineTo(135,190);
                context.lineWidth = 5;
                context.strokeStyle = "rgb(94,94,94)";
                context.stroke();
                for(i=0;i<6;i++) {
                    context.beginPath();
                    var b=1;
                    var a=1;
                    if(i==5) {
                        a=3;
                        b=1.3;
                    }
                    else if(i==4)
                        a==2;
                    x=94+i*9;
                    y=94-i*5;
                    z=95-i*19;
                    context.moveTo(122.5+i*i,180-i*15);
                    context.lineTo(72.5+i*i+i*i*b,180-i*15-i*i*i+i*i*a);
                    context.lineWidth = 8;
                    context.strokeStyle = 'rgb('+ x +','+ y +','+ z +')';
                    context.stroke();
                }
            };

It ain't pretty but looks a bit like the SO logo. Test fiddle here - http://jsfiddle.net/elssar/jcYtg/2/

Answer 7

LaTeX

Using the TikZ and PGF packages.

\documentclass{minimal}
\usepackage{tikz}
\pagestyle{empty}
\begin{document}
\xdefinecolor{col1}{RGB}{167, 149, 116}
\xdefinecolor{col2}{RGB}{189, 153, 87}
\xdefinecolor{col3}{RGB}{211, 157, 57}
\xdefinecolor{col4}{RGB}{233, 161, 28}
\xdefinecolor{col5}{RGB}{255, 165, 0}
\begin{tikzpicture}
\draw[gray, fill=gray] (-1,0.5) -- (-1,0) -- (0,0) -- (0,0.5) -- (-0.1,0.5) -- (-0.1,0.1) -- (-0.9,0.1) -- (-0.9,0.5) -- (-1,0.5);
\draw[gray, fill=gray] (-0.8,0.3) rectangle(-0.2,0.2); 
\draw[col1, fill=col1, xshift=0.3pt, yshift=3pt,  rotate around={-15:(0.2,0.2)}] (-0.8,0.3) rectangle(-0.2,0.2); 
\draw[col2, fill=col2, xshift=0.5pt, yshift=6pt,  rotate around={-30:(0.2,0.2)}] (-0.8,0.3) rectangle(-0.2,0.2); 
\draw[col3, fill=col3, xshift=0.8pt, yshift=9pt,  rotate around={-45:(0.2,0.2)}] (-0.8,0.3) rectangle(-0.2,0.2); 
\draw[col4, fill=col4, xshift=1.3pt, yshift=12pt, rotate around={-60:(0.2,0.2)}] (-0.8,0.3) rectangle(-0.2,0.2); 
\draw[col5, fill=col5, xshift=2.1pt, yshift=14pt, rotate around={-75:(0.2,0.2)}] (-0.8,0.3) rectangle(-0.2,0.2); 
\end{tikzpicture}
\end{document}

Answer 8

PHP w/ GD

<?php
$img = imagecreatetruecolor(67,68);
$white = imagecolorallocate($img,0xff,0xff,0xff);
$grey = imagecolorallocate($img,0x80,0x81,0x85);
$orng1 = imagecolorallocate($img,0xa6,0x8a,0x6e);
$orng2 = imagecolorallocate($img,0xc0,0x95,0x53);
$orng3 = imagecolorallocate($img,0xd3,0x8b,0x28);
$orng4 = imagecolorallocate($img,0xfd,0x88,0x08);
$orng5 = imagecolorallocate($img,0xfe,0x7a,0x15);
imagefilledrectangle($img,0,0,67,68,$white);

//container
imagefilledrectangle($img,7,41,10,65,$grey);
imagefilledrectangle($img,10,61,44,65,$grey);
imagefilledrectangle($img,41,61,44,41,$grey);

// stack levels
imagefilledrectangle($img,14,52,37,56,$grey); //1st level
imagefilledpolygon($img,array(14,42,14,47,37,49,37,44),4,$orng1);
imagefilledpolygon($img,array(16,32,15,36,37,42,38,38),4,$orng2);
imagefilledpolygon($img,array(22,21,20,24,39,35,41,32),4,$orng3);
imagefilledpolygon($img,array(33,10,31,12,43,30,45,28),4,$orng4);
imagefilledpolygon($img,array(45,5,48,5,51,27,48,27),4,$orng5);
header("Content-type: image/png");
imagepng($img);
?>

Example:

Answer 9

C#/GDI+

I was surprised when I noticed there's no C# answer here. So here's one. This is not an ingenious way of drawing the logo, and is not a short solution either. But gets the required output.

You can check my blog post out to download the full working solution → http://guganeshan.com/blog/stackoverflow-logo-using-csharp-and-gdi.html

public class SOLogo
{
    private float _rotateValue;
    private float _xValueForTransformation;
    private float _yValueForTransformation;

    int _containerWidth;
    int _containerHeight;
    float _lineThickness;
    int _paddingWithinContainer;
    int _elementStartY;

    public SOLogo(float rotateValue, float xValueForTransformation, float yValueForTransformation)
    {
        // Values used to position and rotate the overflowing elements.
        _rotateValue = rotateValue;
        _xValueForTransformation  = xValueForTransformation;
        _yValueForTransformation = yValueForTransformation;
    }

    public void DrawLogo(Graphics g, int startX, int startY)
    {
        // Backup the current smoothing mode to apply later.
        var SmoothingMoodBackup = g.SmoothingMode;
        g.SmoothingMode = System.Drawing.Drawing2D.SmoothingMode.AntiAlias;

        // Values for the container box.
        _containerWidth = 94;
        _containerHeight = 61;
        _lineThickness = 11f;
        _paddingWithinContainer = 15;

        // Y value of the position where the 1st overflowing element starts.
        _elementStartY = 0;

        // Starting point of the 'container' - Top point of the line on the left-> |_|
        Point pointContainerLineStart = new Point(startX, startY);

        Point pointContainer1stLineEnd = new Point(pointContainerLineStart.X, pointContainerLineStart.Y); // Start with the previous
        pointContainer1stLineEnd.Offset(0, _containerHeight); // Offset "Y"

        Point pointContainer2ndLineEnd = new Point(pointContainer1stLineEnd.X, pointContainer1stLineEnd.Y); // Start with the previous
        pointContainer2ndLineEnd.Offset(_containerWidth, 0); // Offset "X"

        Point pointContainer3rdLineEnd = new Point(pointContainer2ndLineEnd.X, pointContainer2ndLineEnd.Y); // Start with the previous
        pointContainer3rdLineEnd.Offset(0, 0 - _containerHeight); // Offset "Y" (negative)

        GraphicsPath pathOfBox = new GraphicsPath();
        pathOfBox.AddLine(pointContainerLineStart, pointContainer1stLineEnd); // Left line. Top to bottom
        pathOfBox.AddLine(pointContainer1stLineEnd, pointContainer2ndLineEnd); // Bottom line. Left to right
        pathOfBox.AddLine(pointContainer2ndLineEnd, pointContainer3rdLineEnd); // Right line. Bottom to top

        Pen thickPen = new Pen(Brushes.Gray, _lineThickness);
        Color elementColor = Color.FromKnownColor(KnownColor.Gray);

        // Draw the 'container'
        g.DrawPath(thickPen, pathOfBox);

        // Increase the size of the pen to draw the elements inside the container
        thickPen.Width = _lineThickness += 3;
        // "Y" - position of the 1st element
        _elementStartY = startY + 38;

        // The following section draws the overflowing elements

        Point pointElement1Left = new Point(startX + _paddingWithinContainer, _elementStartY);
        Point pointElement1Right = new Point((startX + _containerWidth) - _paddingWithinContainer, _elementStartY);

        // Six colors of the overflowing elements
        var colors = new Color[] {
            Color.Gray,                 Color.FromArgb(-6911615),   Color.FromArgb(-4417693),
            Color.FromArgb(-2848227),   Color.FromArgb(-554957),    Color.FromArgb(-688847)
        };

        for (int x = 0; x < 6; x++)
        {
            thickPen.Color = colors[x];
            pointElement1Left = new Point(startX + _paddingWithinContainer, _elementStartY);
            pointElement1Right = new Point((startX + _containerWidth) - _paddingWithinContainer, _elementStartY);
            g.DrawLine(thickPen, pointElement1Left, pointElement1Right);
            g.RotateTransform(_rotateValue);
            g.TranslateTransform(_xValueForTransformation, _yValueForTransformation);
        }

        pathOfBox.Dispose();
        thickPen.Dispose();

        // Restore the smoothing mood that was backed up before we started this method.
        g.SmoothingMode = SmoothingMoodBackup;
    }
}

Answer 10

Scala

object LogoCanvas extends javax.swing.JPanel {

  import java.awt._

    def viereck (g: Graphics, points: scala.List[(Int, Int)]) = {
      val polygon = new Polygon ()
      points.foreach (p => polygon.addPoint (10 * p._1, 400 - 10 * p._2))
      g.fillPolygon (polygon)           
    }

  override def paint (g: Graphics) = {
    g.setColor (Color.GRAY);
    // ablage
    viereck (g, scala.List ((2, 1), (2, 11), (3, 11), (3, 1)))
    viereck (g, scala.List ((2, 1), (2, 2), (23, 2), (23, 1)))
    viereck (g, scala.List ((23, 1), (23, 11), (24, 11), (24, 1)))
    // blaetter flach
    viereck (g, scala.List ((5, 5), (5, 6), (21, 6), (21, 5)))
    viereck (g, scala.List ((5, 9), (5, 10), (21, 10), (21, 9)))
    // blaetter schraeg
    g.setColor (Color.LIGHT_GRAY);
    viereck (g, scala.List ((7, 22), (8, 23), (21, 13), (21, 12)))
    viereck (g, scala.List ((12, 28), (13, 29), (22, 15), (21, 14)))
    // blaetter steil
    g.setColor (Color.ORANGE);
    viereck (g, scala.List ((18, 34), (19, 34), (23, 17), (22, 16)))
    viereck (g, scala.List ((24, 36), (25, 36), (25, 17), (24, 17)))
  }

  import javax.swing._

  def main (args: Array [String]) : Unit = {
    val jf = new JFrame ("Stackoverflow!")  
    jf.setSize (350, 520)
    jf.setLocationRelativeTo (null)
    jf.setBackground (Color.BLACK)
    jf.add (LogoCanvas)
    jf.setDefaultCloseOperation (WindowConstants.EXIT_ON_CLOSE) 
    jf.setVisible (true)            
  }
}

Answer 11

CSS+JavaScript (HTML div based)

* { padding: 0; margin: 0; }

div { position: absolute; width: 100px; height: 20px; background-color: red; }
.s { background-color: gray; }
#d0,#d2 { width: 20px; height: 70px; }
#d0 { left: 20px; top: 160px; }
#d1 { left: 20px; top: 230px; width: 160px; }
#d2 { left: 160px; top: 160px; }

.e { -moz-transform-origin: 200% center; -ms-transform-origin: 200% center; -o-transform-origin: 200% center; -webkit-transform-origin: 200% center; transform-origin: 200% center; }

$(document).ready(function() {
    for (var i = 0; i < 9; i++)
        $('body').append($('<div/>').attr('id', 'd' + i).attr('class', i < 3 ? 's' : 'e'))

    $('.e').each(function(i) {
        $(this).css({
            left: (50 - i * 3) + 'px',
            top: '200px',
            backgroundColor: '#' + (i + 10).toString(16) + 'a' + (10 - i * 2).toString(16),
            '-moz-transform': 'rotate(' + (i * 15) + 'deg)',
            '-ms-transform': 'rotate(' + (i * 15) + 'deg)',
            '-o-transform': 'rotate(' + (i * 15) + 'deg)',
            '-webkit-transform': 'rotate(' + (i * 15) + 'deg)',
            transform: 'rotate(' + (i * 15) + 'deg)'
        });
    });
});

Sample run: http://jsfiddle.net/ryzBx/

Sample rendering (Firefox 14):

Answer 12

JavaScript + jQuery & SVG - 250

$('body').html('<svg><g stroke-width="6" fill="none"$grey" d="m3,51v31h47V53M10,70h33"/$#a86" d="m10,57 33,3"/$#b95" d="m13,42 31,9"/$#c82" d="m20,25 28,17"/$#e80" d="m34,9 19,27"/$#f71" d="m56,1 4,32"/></g></svg>'.replace(/\$/g, '><path stroke="'))​

I took Ilmari Karonen's SVG and used JavaScript to replace $s with ><path stroke=" effectively shortening it even with the overhead of JavaScript.

Answer 13

R

Not the prettiest solution but it returns the requested output.

library(grid)
my.palette <- colorRampPalette(c("grey57","orange"))(6)
png("StackOverflow_Logo.png", width=300, height=300)
pushViewport(viewport(x=0.5, y=0.5, w=unit(100, "points"), h=unit(100, "points")))
grid.polygon(x=unit(c(10, 0, 0, 100, 100, 90, 90, 10),"points"), 
             y=unit(c(50, 50, 0, 0, 50, 50, 10, 10),"points"),
             default.units="points", gp=gpar(col = "grey57", fill="grey57"))
grid.rect(vp=viewport(x=0.5, y=0.3, w=unit(70, "points"), h=unit(10, "points")), 
          gp=gpar(col = "grey57", fill="grey57"))

grid.rect(vp=viewport(x=0.52, y=0.52, w=unit(70, "points"), h=unit(10, "points"), angle=-10), 
          gp=gpar(col = my.palette[2], fill=my.palette[2]))

grid.rect(vp=viewport(x=0.58, y=0.78, w=unit(70, "points"), h=unit(10, "points"), angle=-20), 
          gp=gpar(col = my.palette[3], fill=my.palette[3]))

grid.rect(vp=viewport(x=0.70, y=1.05, w=unit(70, "points"), h=unit(10, "points"), angle=-35), 
          gp=gpar(col = my.palette[4], fill=my.palette[4]))

grid.rect(vp=viewport(x=0.90, y=1.25, w=unit(70, "points"), h=unit(10, "points"), angle=-55), 
          gp=gpar(col = my.palette[5], fill=my.palette[5]))

grid.rect(vp=viewport(x=1.15, y=1.38, w=unit(70, "points"), h=unit(10, "points"), angle=-70), 
          gp=gpar(col = my.palette[6], fill=my.palette[6]))
dev.off()