SIMATIC AX Project Structure Explained for TIA Portal Engineers - Mendix Forum

SIMATIC AX Project Structure Explained for TIA Portal Engineers

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I spent some time learning SIMATIC AX after 15+ years in TIA Portal.

The project structure looks completely different — text files instead of a project tree, YAML instead of hardware catalog, CLI instead of GUI.

But! Every single TIA Portal concept has a direct equivalent. OBs, FBs, FCs, DBs, tag tables — they are all there, just packaged differently.

I put together the mapping guide I wish I had when I started.

Full article:

https://otomakeit.com/blog/simatic-ax-project-structure-explained-for-tia-portal-engineers/

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1 comments

Hi Yuriy,

nice comparison! I noticed some minor details while reading that.


  1. There is a direct equivalent to the OB100 in SIMATIC AX LCE: The Startup Task.
  2. Strictly speaking, the direct equivalent to the OB1 from TIA is the ProgramCycle.
  3. Function_Blocks in SIMATIC AX LCE offer some OOP features (specifically offering METHODs), but they do not support Inheritance and Interface implementation. CLASS is the thing you want to use for OOP in SIMATIC AX. This might be especially relevant for users familiar with systems where there is no CLASS keyword and OOP has been fully implemented for the FUNCTION_BLOCK POU.


Cheers!

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Thank you very much, Christof, for this information! I have just started learning Simatic AX, and sharing the information I am learning myself. So great to have comments like yours to correct and add the info!

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