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Getting Started

With UP and the associated project wizard, a new, fully executable project can be created within minutes. It forms the shell for your future complete PLC project and can be extended as required. Here we show you how such a project can be created, downloaded to one of the target platforms and started.

What you need

  • UPstudio — the complete package can be downloaded from the AVM Sharepoint. Extract the archive and start the UPstudio application; there is nothing else to install.
  • The toolchain of your target platform — B&R Automation Studio, Beckhoff TwinCAT or Siemens TIA Portal. UP generates the application code into a project of that toolchain, which then builds it and downloads it to the controller.
  • Optional: Visual Studio Code with the UPcode extension, if you would rather model in VS Code. UPcode is a frontend on the same UP runtime — see UPcode.

The path through this chapter

The four steps below build on each other. After the first one you already have a project that generates; the rest explain what the wizard did for you and how the generated code reaches the controller.

Step What you do Result
1. Setup project with wizard Create a UP project, choose the generator for your platform, optionally put the project under Git A running project with a main controller and a ControllerTree
2. Create first controller Add a level and a controller instance to the ControllerTree by hand You know how the model is built up, not just how the wizard fills it
3. Parent - Child Relation Connect controllers across levels — a MAIN controller commanding its children The hierarchy pattern every UP machine is made of
4. Setting up a target project Wire the generated code into your platform's toolchain, build it, download it Your model runs on the controller

Order matters for step 1 and 4

Step 1 needs nothing but UPstudio, so you can walk through the model part first and worry about the target toolchain later. Steps 2 and 3 can be read in any order once the project exists.

Where to go next

  • Model with AI — the UPai Assistant works on the same model through the UP MCP server: describe the controller you want instead of clicking it together. Every change it makes is validated against the UP metamodel before it becomes code.
  • ServiceUI — the web HMI that ships with every UP application: operate the machine, adjust parameters and watch controller states live.
  • Frequently asked questions — the questions that come up most often in the first weeks with UP.