If you want to customize it yourself, please feel free.
(Any time spent learning or having fun is time well spent)
Me personally?
I need to become better aware of a few other dataPoints that sometimes returns unexpected results.
(For example: China’s launch in an hour does not have any weather data in their API:)
… so my current piston shows:
Which, although technically accurate, I don’t like it…
I can code it to look much better in the hover text.
(if I had enough space to code, that is)
It’s worth noting that… a second China launch was also inserted at nearly the last minute… 
I can see this perspective… but also… with China slipping in at the last moment, and intentionally posting no relevant data… I am wondering if it is worth it… Maybe I should code it to update every 6 hours… With a bonus update after a launch… Hmmm…
For those curious, I do have an ulterior motive: I am really trying to respect the owners of the API… The more frequent our requests, the higher their monthly bill.
Surely 4-5 times a day is sufficient?
Edit:
Bonus points because “Every 6 hours” means every import of the piston will fire at a different time!
Mine is still showing some Florida Starlink data. Need to take a look to see if I screwed up a refresh interval somewhere.
5/31/2020, 8:56:50 AM +206ms
+10163ms ║Piston waited at a semaphore for 10029ms
5/31/2020, 7:57:20 AM +77ms
+1739ms ║The next launch is scheduled for Sun, May 31 2020 @ 3:57:21 AM EDT (-4 hrs)
+1739ms ║Starlink-8
+1739ms ║SpaceX plans to launch Falcon 9, from Cape Canaveral AFS, Florida, on pad SLC-40.
+1739ms ║A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will launch the Starlink-8 mission. The launch date is currently targeted for June 03, 2020 (UTC).
+1739ms ║nullVariable ‘Tags:_tags’ not found
5/31/2020, 7:37:32 AM +718ms
+1629ms ║The next launch is scheduled for Sun, May 31 2020 @ 3:37:34 AM EDT (-4 hrs)
+1629ms ║Starlink-8
+1629ms ║SpaceX plans to launch Falcon 9, from Cape Canaveral AFS, Florida, on pad SLC-40.
+1630ms ║A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will launch the Starlink-8 mission. The launch date is currently targeted for June 03, 2020 (UTC).
+1630ms ║nullVariable ‘Tags:_tags’ not found
5/31/2020, 7:16:56 AM +810ms
+2118ms ║The next launch is scheduled for Sun, May 31 2020 @ 3:16:58 AM EDT (-4 hrs)
+2118ms ║Starlink-8
+2118ms ║SpaceX plans to launch Falcon 9, from Cape Canaveral AFS, Florida, on pad SLC-40.
+2118ms ║A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will launch the Starlink-8 mission. The launch date is currently targeted for June 03, 2020 (UTC).
+2118ms ║nullVariable ‘Tags:_tags’ not found
5/30/2020, 5:56:16 PM +139ms
+531ms ║The next launch is scheduled for Thu, Jun 11 2020 @ 12:43:00 AM EDT (11.3 days)
+531ms ║"Don’t Stop Me Now" (ELaNa 32)
+531ms ║Rocket Lab plans to launch Electron, from Rocket Lab Launch Complex, Mahia Peninsula, New Zealand, on pad LC-1.
+531ms ║A Rocket Lab Electron rocket will launch the “Don’t Stop Me Now” (ELaNa 32) mission on Thursday, June 11, 2020 at 4:43 AM (UTC).
+531ms ║nullVariable ‘Tags:_tags’ not found
5/30/2020, 5:36:17 PM +172ms
+2337ms ║The next launch is scheduled for Thu, Jun 11 2020 @ 12:43:00 AM EDT (11.3 days)
+2337ms ║"Don’t Stop Me Now" (ELaNa 32)
+2337ms ║Rocket Lab plans to launch Electron, from Rocket Lab Launch Complex, Mahia Peninsula, New Zealand, on pad LC-1.
+2337ms ║A Rocket Lab Electron rocket will launch the “Don’t Stop Me Now” (ELaNa 32) mission on Thursday, June 11, 2020 at 4:43 AM (UTC).
+2337ms ║nullVariable ‘Tags:_tags’ not found
5/30/2020, 5:16:16 PM +142ms
+2309ms ║The next launch is scheduled for Sat, May 30 2020 @ 3:22:00 PM EDT (-2 hrs)
+2310ms ║Crew Dragon Demo-2 (DM-2)
+2310ms ║SpaceX plans to launch Falcon 9, from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on pad LC-39A.
+2310ms ║A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched the Crew Dragon Demo-2 (DM-2) mission on Saturday, May 30, 2020 at 7:22 PM (UTC).
+2310ms ║For the first time since the last flight of the Space Shuttle in 2011, U.S. astronauts will go to orbit from American soil. As part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, SpaceX’s Falcon 9 will launch the Crew Dragon spacecraft to the International Space Station.Variable ‘Tags:_tags’ not found
The “next launch is scheduled for” section came out wrong because the API only listed the day as 3 instead of 03… So I need to tweak my code a bit to account for that.
Also, I just noticed a missing quote for tags, so that was my bad.
Expect an update in about 20 minutes…
My piston in the original post has been updated with a handful of small tweaks.
(the changes are mostly date and time related)
I also limited the location in the tile to the first 20 characters, so it will always be legible…
(the hover text will still show the full location name)
@guxdude, it’s worth mentioning that I had to tweak your {tzOffset} to make it work consistently.
Note for updaters… Please don’t forget to change the first line after “execute” to a different minute than 6 so we spread out our queries… (and of course, delete or pause your old piston)
New screenshot:
Hmmm… The updated piston should not be showing the “Crew Dragon” any more…
(remember, it may take up to 67 minutes for a new piston to populate the variables)
Sorry for the confusion, I meant I was still watching the stream online 
piston appears to be working correctly!
Interesting. I hadn’t 't seen it fail but hadn’t tested it as much as this piston does. Makes sense a truncation could get inconsistent results. Will update my other uses of this. Thanks!
@guxdude, 6 posts were split to a new topic: Rocket Launch (Dual Piston fork)
Feel free to edit the title/posts as you wish…
Thanks for the simplification, @Alwas…
Ironically, I am going in the opposite direction…
(I’m trying enhance this piston even more)
Apparently, the launch window changes more often that we first assumed…
My next version will have more frequent updates to the API to account for this…
(the next launch is in 45 minutes… not 18)
I love how they timed the return of Stage-2 at almost exactly two orbits later.
(I’ve actually been wondering for years why this was not the norm)
It’s definitely a smart way to save on retrieval & transportation costs!
Side Note:
I have not tested it yet, but the NASA reporter shared a SpaceX link that I want to remember to check out later…
<quote>
This simulator will familiarize you with the controls of the actual interface used by NASA Astronauts to manually pilot the SpaceX Dragon 2 vehicle to the International Space Station."
</quote>
Tagging @Alwas
I just captured a new screenshot…
For the observant ones, you can see the crazy long launch location reduced to 20 characters…
Edit a few hours later… It’s less than a week now, so the tile shifted to a gauge…
I was not awake but saw the data change on my 20x minute interval! Still looking forward to your next interpretation though
Ended playing this for about 30 minutes this morning! Pretty cool
I wonder if we need to plan against win_close vs win_open somehow. The ISS mission had an instantaneous launch window so wasn’t a good example for this.
I thought about that… but decided against it… Mainly because:
Any science-buff will turn on the live feed shortly before win_open.
(and the info there will be official and updated much quicker than the unofficial API)
In other words, personally, I do not care when the window closes. I want to know the earliest possible launch, so I catch all the action. (although technically, the launch can happen anytime within that window)
For reference, I tend to leave an extra monitor displaying the live feed for the whole event…
Very true. I was just thinking the window length at least gives us an idea how far the launch can move before it will be scrubbed. But, as you say, once you are watching live, the API update is more of a curiosity since you are getting real time information.
