ISS Tracker

ISS Tracker queries a live API for the current GPS position of the International Space Station, plotting it as a red dot on a map of Earth. As time passes, a red trail marks the path the station has traveled.

This demo illustrates two key p5.js concepts: loading external assets via preload() — which ensures the globe image is ready before the sketch runs — and fetching live data from a remote API using loadJSON(). It also exposed some interesting quirks of running p5 inside an iframe, which helped shape how this theme handles sketch embedding.

The original source of this sketch is unknown but may originate from The Coding Train, Daniel Shiffman’s excellent YouTube channel covering creative coding with p5.js.