1, Foreword
- Open Notify is an open source project designed to provide a simple programming interface for some of NASA's outstanding data.
- The authors of open-notify.org did some work to obtain raw data and convert it into API s related to space and spacecraft.
- Now through this interface, we will get the location of the international space station and draw it on the map in real time.
- In order to achieve this goal, ISS must be installed first_ Info:
pip install ISS-Info
2, Map initialization
- In order to show the path of the international space station in real time, a curve needs to be drawn by using turtle, so you can create a turtle canvas and set the background as earth:
import ISS_Info
import turtle
import time
import json
import urllib.request
screen = turtle.Screen()
screen.setup(720, 360)
screen.setworldcoordinates(-180, -90, 180,90)
screen.bgpic("map.png")
screen.bgcolor("black")
screen.register_shape("isss.gif")
screen.title("Real time ISS tracker")
iss = turtle.Turtle()
iss.shape("isss.gif")
- The effects are as follows:

3, Get the number of people on the space station
- If we can know the number of astronauts on the space station, we can track the international space station more accurately. Fortunately, open notify does provide such an interface.
- In order to obtain the number of people information, you must request the data from the following interfaces and write the corresponding astronaut's name in the upper left corner:
http://api.open-notify.org/astros.json
astronauts = turtle.Turtle()
astronauts.penup()
astronauts.color('black')
astronauts.goto(-178,86)
astronauts.hideturtle()
url = "http://api.open-notify.org/astros.json"
response = urllib.request.urlopen(url)
result = json.loads(response read())
print("There are currently " + str(result ["number"]) + " astronauts in space:")
print("")
astronauts.write("People in space: " + str(result["number"]), font=style)
astronauts.sety(astronauts.ycor() - 5)
people = result["people"]
for p in people:
print(p["name"] + " on: " + p["craft"])
astronauts.write(p["name" ] + "on:" + p["craft"], font=style)
astronauts.sety(astronauts.ycor() - 5)
- The effects are as follows:

4, Draw station location
- In order to draw the real-time position of the space station, it is necessary to request the position information of the space station. The requested interface is:
http://api.open-notify.org/iss-now.json
- However, the author encapsulates it into a function, and we call ISS directly_ current_ LOC to obtain the location of the international space station:
while True :
location = ISS_Info.iss_current_loc()
lat = location['iss_ position']['latitude']
lon = location['iss_ position']['longitude']
print("Position: \n latitude: {}, longitude: {}" .format(lat, lon))
pos = iss.pos()
posx = iss.xcor()
if iss.xcor() >= (179.1): ### Stop drawing at the right edge of
iss.penup() ### the screen to avoid a
iss.goto(float(lon), float(lat)) ### horizontal wrap round line
time.sleep(5)
else:
iss.goto(float(lon), float(lat))
iss.pendown()
time.sleep(5)
- We can also mark our current position to see the distance from the international space station and the point in time (UTC) when the space station passes over you.
# Shenzhen
lat = 112.5118928
lon = 23.8534489
prediction = turtle.Turtle()
prediction.penup()
prediction.color('yellow')
prediction.goto(lat, lon)
prediction.dot(5)
prediction.hideturtle()
url = 'http://api.open-notify.org/iss-pass.json?lat=' + str(lat-90) + '&lon=' + str(lon)
response = urllib.request.urlopen(url)
result = json.loads(response.read())
over = result ['response'][1]['risetime']
prediction.write(time.ctime(over), font=style)
- However, it is worth noting that the latitude calculation of iss-pass.json interface must be within - 90 to 90, so the latitude of Shenzhen needs to be subtracted by 90.
- The final effect is as follows:
