Dutch Trains Dashboard Tile

A Livewire tile for Spatie Laravel Dashboard that displays upcoming departures and active station disruptions using the NS Reisinformatie API.

Requirements

• PHP 8.4 or later
• Laravel 11, 12, or 13
• Livewire 4
• Spatie Laravel Dashboard 4
• An NS API subscription key for the Reisinformatie API

Installation

Install the package in your Laravel dashboard application:

composer require creacoon/laravel-dashboard-dutch-trains

Laravel discovers the package service provider automatically. It registers the dashboard:fetch-live-departure-board command and the live-departure-board-tile Livewire component.

NS API Key

Create or sign in to an account at the NS API Portal, find the Reisinformatie API in the API catalogue, and subscribe to its product. The portal provides a subscription key for requests to the API.

Add the key to the host application's .env file:

NS_API_KEY=your-ns-subscription-key

The package reads dashboard.tiles.live_departure_board.api_key, so the host app must map NS_API_KEY to that config key as shown below. Keep the key private and do not commit it to source control.

Configuration

Add the tile configuration under tiles in the host application's config/dashboard.php:

'tiles' => [
    // Other dashboard tiles...
    'live_departure_board' => [
        'api_key' => env('NS_API_KEY'),
        'station' => 'Rm',
        'station_name' => 'Roermond',
        'visible_departures' => 5,
        'visible_disruptions' => 2,
        'timezone' => 'Europe/Amsterdam',
        'refresh_interval_in_seconds' => 60,
    ],
],

Use an NS station code for station and the human-readable station name for station_name. visible_departures controls the maximum number of departures shown; it is clamped to at least one. visible_disruptions controls how many disruptions appear in the tile; any additional active disruptions are counted below the list. timezone controls the displayed departure times. refresh_interval_in_seconds controls how often the tile re-renders from the stored data; it defaults to 60. After changing cached configuration in production, refresh it with php artisan config:cache.

Schedule Departure Updates

The tile displays the most recently stored departures and active disruptions for the configured station. Schedule the fetch command so the data stays current. In Laravel 11 and later, add this to routes/console.php:

use Illuminate\Support\Facades\Schedule;

Schedule::command('dashboard:fetch-live-departure-board')->everyFiveMinutes();

Ensure Laravel's scheduler is running on the server. Add the following cron entry, replacing the project path as appropriate:

* * * * * cd /path/to/your-project && php artisan schedule:run >> /dev/null 2>&1

You can also fetch departures manually to verify the configuration:

php artisan dashboard:fetch-live-departure-board

Add the Tile

Place the Livewire component in the host application's dashboard layout, using an available dashboard position:

<livewire:live-departure-board-tile position="a1" />

The tile shows the station from the station and station_name config by default.

Show Multiple Stations

To show another station, pass its NS station code and display name to the tile:

<livewire:live-departure-board-tile position="a1" />
<livewire:live-departure-board-tile position="a2" station="Rtd" station-name="Rotterdam Centraal" />

Each station keeps its own data, so schedule the fetch command once per extra station with the --station option:

Schedule::command('dashboard:fetch-live-departure-board')->everyFiveMinutes();
Schedule::command('dashboard:fetch-live-departure-board --station=Rtd')->everyFiveMinutes();