ASCII Art of the Day #2 - Flow Snakes

Python 2, 428 411 388 bytes

This one was pretty tricky. The patterns don't retain their ratios after each step meaning its very difficult to procedurally produce an image from its predecessor. What this code does, though its pretty unreadable after some intense math golfing, is actually draw the line from start to finish using the recursively defined D function.

The size was also an issue, and I ended up just starting in the middle of a 5*3**n sided square and cropping things afterward, though if I can think of better way to calculate the size I might change it.

n=input();s=5*3**n
r=[s*[" "]for i in[0]*s]
def D(n,x,y,t=0):
 if n<1:
    x-=t%2<1;y+=t%3>1;r[y][x]='_/\\'[t/2]
    if t<2:r[y][x+2*t-1]='_'
    return[-1,2,0,1,0,1][t]+x,y-(2<t<5)
 for c in[int(i)^t%2for i in"424050035512124224003"[t/2::3]][::(t^1)-t]:x,y=D(n-1,x,y,c)
 return x,y
D(n,s/2,s/2)
S=[''.join(c).rstrip()for c in r]
for l in[c[min(c.find('\\')%s for c in S):]for c in S if c]:print l

f=o=>{
  g=[],x=y=b=0,
  h='064500192116501921602249954410249541255690664256'.split(9);
  for(p=h[2];--o;)p=p.replace(/./g,c=>h[c]);
  for(t of p)
    z='\\/_'[s=t&3],
    d=s-(s<1),
    t>3&&(x-=d,y+=s<2),
    y<0&&(y++,g=[,...g]),r=g[y]=g[y]||[],
    s?s>1?r[x]=r[x+1]=z:r[x]=z:r[x-1]=z,
    t<3&&(x+=d,y-=s<2),
    x<b?b=x:0;
  g.map(r=>
  {
    for(x=b;x<r.length;)o+=r[x++]||' ';
    o+='\n'
  },o='');
  return o
}

// TEST

fs=9;
O.style.fontSize=fs+'px'

function zoom(d) { 
  d += fs;
  if (d > 1 && d < 40)
    fs=d, O.style.fontSize=d+'px'
}

#O {
  font-size: 9px;
  line-height: 1em;
}

<input id=I value=3><button onclick='O.innerHTML=f(I.value)'>-></button>
<button onclick="zoom(2)">Zoom +</button><button onclick="zoom(-2)">Zoom -</button>
<br>
<pre id=O></pre>

answered May 21, 2015 at 10:44

edc65

32.3k3 gold badges37 silver badges90 bronze badges

Haskell, 265 bytes

(?)=div
(%)=mod
t[a,b]=[3*a+b,2*b-a]
_#[0,0]=0
0#_=3
n#p=[352,6497,2466,-1]!!((n-1)#t[(s+3)?7|s<-p])?(4^p!!0%7)%4
0&_=0
n&p=(n-1)&t p+maximum(abs<$>sum p:p)
n!b=n&[1,-b]
f n=putStr$unlines[["__ \\/   "!!(2*n#t[a?2,-b]+a%2)|a<-[b-n!2+1..b+n!2+0^n?3]]|b<-[-n!0..n!0]]

(Note: on GHC before 7.10, you will need to add import Control.Applicative or replace abs<$> with map abs$.)

Run online at Ideone.com

f n :: Int -> IO () draws the level n flowsnake. The drawing is computed in bitmap order rather than along the curve, which allows the algorithm to run in O(n) space (that is, logarithmic in the drawing size). Nearly half of my bytes are spent computing which rectangle to draw!

Haskell, 469 419 390 385 365 bytes

the function f::Int->IO() takes an integer as input and print the flow snake

e 0=[0,0];e 5=[5,5];e x=[x]
f n=putStr.t$e=<<g n[0]
k=map$(53-).fromEnum
g 0=id
g n=g(n-1).(=<<)(k.(words"5402553 5440124 1334253 2031224 1345110 2003510"!!))
x=s$k"444666555666"
y=s$k"564645554545"
r l=[minimum l..maximum l]
s _[]=[];s w(x:y)=w!!(x+6):map(+w!!x)(s w y)
t w=unlines[["_/\\\\/_ "!!(last$6:[z|(c,d,z)<-zip3(x w)(y w)w,c==i&&d==j])|i<-r.x$w]|j<-r.y$w]

CJam, 144 bytes

0_]0a{{_[0X3Y0_5]f+W@#%~}%}ri*{_[YXW0WW]3/If=WI6%2>#f*.+}fI]2ew{$_0=\1f=~-
"__1a /L \2,"S/=(@\+\~.+}%_2f<_:.e>\:.e<:M.-:)~S*a*\{M.-~3$3$=\tt}/zN*

Newline added to avoid scrolling. Try it online

The program works in several steps:

1. The initial fractal (order 1) is encoded as a sequence of 7 angles (conceptually, multiples of 60°) representing the direction of movement
2. The fractal is "applied" to a horizontal segment (order 0 fractal) N times to generate all the "movements" in the order N fractal
3. Starting from [0 0], the movements are translated into a sequence of points with [x y] coordinates
4. Each segment (pair of points) is converted to 1 or 2 [x y c] triplets, representing the character c at coordinates x, y
5. The bounding rectangle is determined, the coordinates are adjusted and a matrix of spaces is generated
6. For each triplet, the character c is placed at position x, y in the matrix, and the final matrix is adjusted for output

C, 479 474 468 427 bytes

There's no beating the Perl and Haskell guys I guess, but since there's no C submission here yet:

#define C char
C *q="053400121154012150223433102343124450553245";X,Y,K,L,M,N,i,c,x,y,o;F(C*p,
int l,C d){if(d){l*=7;C s[l];for(i=0;i<l;i++)s[i]=q[(p[i/7]%8)*7+i%7];return F
(s,l,d-1);}x=0;y=0;o=32;while(l--){c=*p++%8;for(i=!(c%3)+1;i--;) {K=x<K?x:K;L=
y<L?y:L;M=x>M?x:M;N=y>N?y:N;y+=c&&c<3;x-=c%5>1;if(x==X&y==Y)o="_\\/"[c%3];y-=c
>3;x+=c%5<2;}}return X<M?o:10;}main(l){F(q,7,l);for(Y=L;Y<N;Y++)for(X=K;X<=M;X
++)putchar(F(q,7,l));}

To save space on a atoi() call, the number of arguments passed to the program is used for the level.

The program runs in O(n^3) or worse; first the path is calculated once to find the min/max coordinates, then for each (x,y) pair it is calculated once to find the character on that specific location. Terribly slow, but saves on memory administration.

Example run at http://codepad.org/ZGc648Xi

Python 2, 523 502 475 473 467 450 437 bytes

l=[0]
for _ in l*input():l=sum([map(int,'004545112323312312531204045045050445212331'[t::6])for t in l],[])
p=[]
x=y=q=w=Q=W=0
for t in l:T=t|4==5;c=t in{2,4};C=t<3;q=min(q,x);Q=max(Q,x+C);w=min(w,y);W=max(W,y);a=C*2-1;a*=2-(t%3!=0);b=(1-T&c,-1)[T&1-c];x+=(a,0)[C];y+=(0,b)[c];p+=[(x,y)];x+=(0,a)[C];y+=(b,0)[c]
s=[[' ']*(Q-q)for _ in[0]*(W-w+1)]
for t,(x,y)in zip(l,p):x-=q;s[y-w][x:x+1+(t%3<1)]='_/\_'[t%3::3]
for S in s:print''.join(S)

Pffft, costed me a like 3 hours, but was fun to do!

The idea is to split the task in multiple steps:

1. Calculate all the edges (encoded as 0-5) in order of appearence (so from the beginning of the snake to the end)
2. Calculate the position for each of the edges (and save the min and max values for x and y)
3. Build the strings it consists of (and use the min values to offset, so that we don't get negative indices)
4. Print the strings

Here is the code in ungolfed form:

# The input
n = int(input())

# The idea:
# Use a series of types (_, /, \, %), and positions (x, y)
# Forwards:   0: __  1: /  2: \
# Backwards:  3: __  4: /  5: \

# The parts
pieces = [
    "0135002",
    "0113451",
    "4221502",
    "5332043",
    "4210443",
    "5324551"
]
# The final types list
types = [0]
for _ in range(n):
    old = types
    types = []
    for t in old:
        types.extend(map(int,pieces[t]))

# Calculate the list of positions (and store the mins and max')
pos = []
top = False
x = 0
y = 0
minX = 0
minY = 0
maxX = 0
maxY = 0
for t in types:
    # Calculate dx
    dx = 1 if t < 3 else -1
    if t%3==0:
        dx *= 2         # If it's an underscore, double the horizontal size
    # Calculate dy
    top = t in {1, 5}
    dy = 0
    if top and t in {0, 3, 1, 5}:
        dy = -1
    if not top and t in {2, 4}:
        dy = 1
    # If backwards, add dx before adding the position to the list
    if t>2:
        x += dx
    # If top to bottom, add dy before adding the position to the list
    if t in {2,4}:
        y += dy
    # Add the current position to the list
    pos += [(x, y)]
    # In the normal cases (going forward and up) modify the x and y after changing the position
    if t<3:
        x += dx
    if t not in {2, 4}:
        y += dy
    # Store the max and min vars
    minX = min(minX, x)
    maxX = max(maxX, x + (t<3)) # For forward chars, add one to the length (we never end with __'s)
    minY = min(minY, y)
    maxY = max(maxY, y)

# Create the string (a grid of charachters)
s = [[' '] * (maxX - minX) for _ in range(maxY - minY + 1)]
for k, (x, y) in enumerate(pos):
    x -= minX
    y -= minY
    t = types[k]
    char = '/'
    if t % 3 == 0:
        char = '__'
    if t % 3 == 2:
        char = '\\'
    s[y][x : x + len(char)] = char

# Print the string
for printString in s:
    print("".join(printString))

Edit: I changed the language to python 2, to be compatible with my answer for #3 (and it also saves 6 more bytes)

Pari/GP, 395

Looping over x,y character positions and calculating what char to print. Moderate attempts at minimizing, scored with whitespace and comments stripped.

k=3;
{
  S = quadgen(-12);  \\ sqrt(-3)
  w = (1 + S)/2;     \\ sixth root of unity
  b = 2 + w;         \\ base

  \\ base b low digit position under 2*Re+4*Im mod 7 index
  P = [0, w^2, 1, w, w^4, w^3, w^5];
  \\ rotation state table
  T = 7*[0,0,1,0,0,1,2, 1,2,1,0,1,1,2, 2,2,2,0,0,1,2];
  C = ["_","_",  " ","\\",  "/"," "];

  \\ extents
  X = 2*sum(i=0,k-1, vecmax(real(b^i*P)));
  Y = 2*sum(i=0,k-1, vecmax(imag(b^i*P)));

  for(y = -Y, Y,
     for(x = -X+!!k, X+(k<3),  \\ adjusted when endpoint is X limit
        z = (x- (o = (x+y)%2) - y*S)/2;
        v = vector(k,i,
                   z = (z - P[ d = (2*real(z) + 4*imag(z)) % 7 + 1 ])/b;
                   d);
        print1( C[if(z,3,
                     r = 0;
                     forstep(i=#v,1, -1, r = T[r+v[i]];);
                     r%5 + o + 1)]) );  \\ r=0,7,14 mod 5 is 0,2,4
     print())
}

Each char is the first or second of a hexagon cell. A cell location is a complex number z split into base b=2+w with digits 0, 1, w^2, ..., w^5, where w=e^(2pi/6) sixth root of unity. Those digits are kept just as a distinguishing 1 to 7 then taken high to low through a state table for net rotation. This is in the style of flowsnake code by Ed Shouten (xytoi) but only for net rotation, not making digits into an "N" index along the path. The extents are relative to an origin 0 at the centre of the shape. As long as the limit is not an endpoint these are the middle of a 2-character hexagon and only 1 of those chars is needed. But when the snake start and/or end are the X limit 2 chars are needed, which is k=0 start and k<3 end. Pari has "quads" like sqrt(-3) builtin but the same can be done with real and imaginary parts separately.