How to upload and manage projects

Projects in the context of SDA are combinations of hardware configurations and automation control code as used by popular automation development environments (e.g., .zap files of Siemens TIA portal).

Creating a project entry and uploading archive file

Navigate to the Project View (side bar menu) and click on "Create new project"

Project view w/o any projects

Now you can drag & drop an existing project archive file from you local machine to the corresponding area in the screen. Alternative, click on the drop area to manually select a file to upload.

Supported file PLC project archive formats:

• Siemens: .zap17, .zap16, .zap15_1

• Codesys: .projectarchive

• Beckhoff: .tnzip

Create and upload new project form

The PLC vendor and IDE version is automatically selected based on the file ending. Choose a custom name and description for the project.

Note that in case the project is password protected, you can click on "Set project username/password" to specify the password such that it can be used for the automated services of SDA (e.g., project viewer, automated deployment).

View to provide credentials to access the project in case protection is enabled

After successful upload, the project will show up in the project list.

Project view w/ uploaded project

Using project versions

Each project entry can have multiple versions. For instance, you can upload a new version via the context menu on the right, choose "New Project Version".

Project context menu

You can now choose a name for the project version and provide a comment on what was changed. Drag & drop the updated archive file to the corresponding area or click on it to manually select a folder.

After successful upload, the list of project versions can be seen by clicking on the button "Project versions" below the respective project name in the project view.

List of project versions

The upload of new project versions is much simplified via the SDA local client for Windows. Please see the respective section on the local client in this user manual.

Using project tags

Each Project entry can be tagged with custom tags to support filtering and sorting projects. To add a tag, navigate to the project context menu and select "Tags Management".

Tag management form

You can choose a custom name for your tag and click on "Add Tag". After closing the tag management, the tag will appear in the bottom right corner of your project.

Project view with a tagged project entry

Filtering the project view

In the top row of the project view, you can easily filter the project list based on the below listed criteria:

• Devices (see section on Connectivity service)
• PLC Vendor

• IDE Versions

• Tags

Additional functions in the context menu

• Edit: Change the name and the description of the project

• Download: Download your projects to the local machine

• Delete: Delete the entire project entry including all versions

• Link to PLC: See section on the connectivity service in this manual

• License Management: See section on using IDEaaS

Other options available for projects

From the project list you have the following options:

• View project: Visualize the project and be able to compare versions. For more details refer to the section on viewing projects and changes
• Open IDEaaS: Refer to Opening and editing projects using IDE-as-a-Service