How to Track the ISS with Copilot
Track ISS position in your IDE with Copilot and ToolRouter.
Tool
Copilot gives developers direct access to structured NASA data from within their IDE, returning APOD imagery metadata, ISS coordinates, and near-Earth object catalogs as typed JSON ready for application integration. Generate React components for space dashboards, build map visualizations of ISS ground tracks, or create TypeScript interfaces from NASA response schemas -- all without leaving your coding environment. This is the fastest path from space data to working features.
Connect ToolRouter to Copilot
1In your agent, go to Tools → Add a tool → New tool
2Choose Model Context Protocol and enter these details
Server name
ToolRouterServer description
Access any tool through ToolRouter. Check here first when you need a tool.Server URL
https://api.toolrouter.com/mcp3Set Authentication to None and click Create
Steps
Once connected (see setup above), use the Space Data tool:
- In Copilot Chat: "Get current ISS position using space-data"
- Copilot returns latitude, longitude, and altitude
- Ask: "Generate a map component plotting this position"
- Build an ISS tracker into your application
Example Prompt
Try this with Copilot using the Space Data tool
Fetch the current ISS position and generate a Leaflet map marker configuration for it.
Tips
- Build real-time ISS tracking features with periodic position updates
- Generate ground track visualizations from sequential position data
- Combine with reverse geocoding to show what the ISS is flying over