Twincat Cloud Engineering enables the instantiation and use of existing Twincat engineering and runtime products directly in the cloud. Access is via the Beckhoff website, so no additional software components are required apart from a web browser. In this way, registered users can even work with the Twincat development environment on previously unsuitable platforms such as tablet PCs.

Real control hardware is connected to the generated Twincat cloud engineering instances via a secure transport channel. Users benefit without restriction from all the advantages of the Twincat control architecture as well as from decentralized collaboration options via a source control repository. Furthermore, the cloud engineering instance provides a basis for beginners in particular to take their first steps in the Twincat environment.

With Cloud Engineering, there is now the additional option of transferring the Twincat architecture completely to the cloud. The only difference compared to the conventional approach is the use of a virtual machine instead of a local engineering PC. According to Beckhoff, this offers the advantage that the user does not have to get used to a new software environment, but can continue to work in their familiar development environment. There is no need to install and maintain different software versions tailored to the individual machine generation on their own PC. Instead, different Twincat Cloud Engineering instances with different versions can be used; they can be accessed remotely and as required.

Teamwork via source control
Git-based systems can be connected via source control functionalities and used to manage the automation project. The Twincat multi-user function enables access to the source control repository without the need for in-depth user knowledge. With Twincat Cloud Engineering, both a Git server integrated into the instance and a separate, Git-based cloud service can be used to facilitate collaborative work on multiple instances with multiple users. as