This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Cameron Paczek, a 24-year-old software engineer who vibe-coded a DIY flight tracker that projects real-time aircraft movements onto his ceiling. It has been edited for length and clarity.
I just moved to a new house a few weeks ago that puts me right under the flight paths of San Francisco International Airport.
The planes flying in and out of the airport and the surrounding Bay Area are anywhere from 600 to 1,200 feet above me, and I found myself constantly on flight-tracking apps, running in and out to see all the aircraft.
As a software engineer, I eventually came up with the idea of using a projector, a Raspberry Pi mini-computer, an ADS-B radio, and AI-generated code to display real-time flight traffic on my ceiling.
I also hooked up a pan, tilt, zoom camera that automatically locks onto the aircraft and streams it live to my television.
Two weeks ago, I couldn’t tell you which plane was which. I’m familiar with a lot of the daily flights now. The loud jet taking off around 5 pm is probably Emirates’ Airbus A380 to Dubai; the 1 am takeoff is probably China Airlines’ flight to Taipei.
There are hundreds of people interested in buying my ceiling flight map, which I’ve named “Skylight,” but I don’t plan to turn it into a business. Instead, I’ve made the project open source.
That means anyone who knows how to use the equipment or is willing to learn can buy the hardware, download the code, and use AI tools such as Anthropic’s Claude to help set everything up.
Using Claude to vibe-code
I’ve been a software engineer for about 10 years now. I started by setting up Minecraft servers with my friends when I was 14, and later I earned a degree in computer science from San Francisco State University. I’m now a full-time engineer and use Claude every day.
For the flight tracker, I plugged a Raspberry Pi SD card into my laptop, opened Claude Code, pointed it to the project’s repository, and asked it to install the software. (A Raspberry Pi is a tiny computer popular among hobbyists that typically costs less than $100.)
Courtesy of Cameron Paczek
The setup also includes an ADS-B radio that receives aircraft GPS position transmissions. That data is fed into the Raspberry Pi, which generates the flight maps projected onto my ceiling as they take off and land, including the airline, flight number, aircraft type, altitude, and destination.
Outside, a PTZ camera captures aircraft flying overhead, complementing the ceiling map with a livestream of the same flights. I don’t have to run back and forth anymore to enjoy all the planes.
This was only possible because of Claude. The code might not be the highest quality, and I feel there’s a stigma around vibe coding, but this is a home project.
If I had to code everything by hand, it would take me at least 10 hours. With an AI assistant, it’s an hour or two over lunch breaks. It works, it looks cool, and that’s all that matters.
I don’t plan to make this into a full-blown business
There is a ton of interest in Skylight; there are close to 3,600 people on the waitlist for early access.
I’m preparing to put it on Kickstarter as a pre-made kit with all the software pre-loaded, so that someone can just assemble it and be set.
Courtesy of Cameron Paczek
While I plan to do a few hundred sales to make some money, I’m not interested in turning this into a full-blown, long-term business. I have a full-time job, and don’t have enough time.
My ultimate goal is to make it free for anyone to build themselves using the open-source data, so long as they have the equipment and some knowledge of how to use it.
