Starting from Mike's sample (https://gist.github.com/1134768) I stripped down the chart to the bare minimum to understand the physics. I use a matrix instead of a csv or json. With the console.log outputs you can look at the transformation of the matrix when fed into the stack layout.
Modified http://d3js.org/d3.v2.js to a secure url
https://d3js.org/d3.v2.js