Start Page
The Start Page welcomes you introducing PLCnext Engineer. The Start Page is shown every time you start PLCnext Engineer and it is automatically closed when opening or creating a project.
Accessing the Safety-related Area when opening the project
When opening a project, PLCnext Engineer automatically restores all open editors. If safety-related editors have been opened when closing the project the last time, you are prompted to enter the password for accessing the Safety-related Area.
After applying the entered password by clicking
, the Safety-related Area is accessed and you can edit safety-related data (devices, parameters, code, types). You stay logged on until you log off manually or you are automatically logged off due to inactivity.
If you cancel the authentication mask with the
icon, the Safety-related Area is not accessed. Safety-related data are then shown in read-only mode and cannot be edited.
Refer to the topic "Safety-Related Area with Password Protection" for details.
Recent Projects
The 'Recent projects' list shows the projects that you have recently opened in PLCnext Engineer. Click the project name to open the desired project.
When hovering the mouse pointer over the project name, two icons appear on the right of the project name:
  | Pins the project to the 'Recent projects' list so that it will remain on the list until you unpin it. To unpin the project, click the pin icon. |
 | Opens the Windows® file explorer and shows the location of the selected project file. |
Templates and Sample Projects
The 'Sample projects' list provides a list of predefined project templates for the controllers supported by PLCnext Engineer. A project template contains a partially configured PLCnext Engineer project with or without application code which you can adapt as required for your specific application.
The general steps for developing an engineering project are described in the topic "Quickstart/Getting started".