TIA Portal MCP-Server

A Visual Studio Code extension to connect to Siemens TIA Portal and interact with TIA Portal projects directly from VS Code with GitHub Copilot.

Requirements

• Siemens TIA Portal V21 installed and running on your machine

• Siemens.Openness installed

• net Framework 4.8 installed

• Visual Studio Code installed

• GitHub Copilot in Visual Studio Code installed and configured (check: Chat > Mcp: Enabled)

Related MCP server: Genius Automation MCP Server

Chat

The chat allows you to interact with TIA Portal using natural language commands. You can instruct it to perform tasks such as connecting to a project, exporting PLC programs, modifying files, and importing changes back into TIA Portal. The chat works in conjunction with the tia porcelain commands for streamlined workflows.

Chat Examples using natural language

Do the following steps:
- Connect to tia portal
- export plc program
- ... modify files ...
- Give me preview which modified files would be imported to plc program
- Get project tree and save output to project-tree.txt
- Get software tree and save output to software-tree.txt
- Import plc program changes
- Close the project
- Disconnect from tia portal

Do the following steps:
- Connect to tia portal
- Give me the structure of the project and save output to project-structure.txt
- Give me the software structure and save output to software-structure.txt
- Close the project
- Disconnect from tia portal

Do the following steps:
- Connect to tia portal
- Compile plc software
- Close the project
- Disconnect from tia portal

tia porcelain commands: connect, pull and push

Short tools for the chat that work like the git commands they are named after. They sit on top of the tools above: connect attaches to TIA Portal and opens the project, pull brings TIA Portal into the export folder, push brings the changed files of that folder into TIA Portal. Type the command in the chat, e.g. tia pull blocks ".+HMI", or pick the tool or the prompt of the same name.

• TiaConnect connects to the running TIA Portal (or starts one), opens the .apXX project or .alsXX session and returns the PLC software paths to use as softwarePath. path takes the preset of --project-path; pass portalId when several instances run. It closes the project that is open first, unless it is the one asked for.

• The pull tools write the tree of ExportPlcProgram, each object in the format of <exportPath>/tia.json, so a pull of blocks and a pull of the whole program land in the same folders. TiaPullTagTables writes one XML file per tag table below <exportPath>/<softwarePath>/PLC tags/<groups>/, TiaPullWatchTables one per watch table below the watch and force tables folder; both have one format only.

• The optional regular expression (regexName) selects objects by name, e.g. .+HMI. TiaPullBlocks writes no types and TiaPullTypes no blocks.

• The push tools are the import tools under another name and need --allow-write. TiaPush shows the same confirmation dialog ("Yes, import") and TiaPushPreview imports nothing. They read only the files git reports as changed, and not the tag or watch tables; there is no tool that imports tag tables.

• softwarePath and exportPath take the presets from --software-path and --export-path.

Prompts using the tia commands (see "tia porcelain commands" above; with the presets from the json config file softwarePath and exportPath can be left out):

• 'tia connect'

• 'tia pull'

• 'tia pull blocks'

• 'tia pull blocks ".+HMI_.+"'

• 'tia pull types'

• 'tia pull tagtables'

• 'tia pull watchtables'

• 'tia pull block Group1/Subgroup/FB_Motor'

• 'tia pull type Group1/Udt_Drive'

• 'tia pull tagtable TagGroup1/Table1'

• 'tia pull watchtable WatchGroup1/WatchTable_1'

• 'tia pull forcetable ForceTable'

• 'tia push preview'

• 'tia push'

• 'save project'

MCP-Server

• Refer to tiaportal-mcp

Features

• Connect to a TIA Portal instance

• Browse and interact with TIA Portal projects

• Perform basic project operations from within VS Code

Requirements

• .net Framework 4.8 installed

• Siemens TIA Portal V20 installed and running on your machine

• Check if under Environment Variables/User variable for user <name> the variable TiaPortalLocation is set to C:\Program Files\Siemens\Automation\Portal V20. Details on nuget.org - Siemens.Collaboration.Net.TiaPortal.Openness.Resolver

• User must be in Windows User Group Siemens TIA Openness. Details on TIA Portal Openness - Adding Users to the Siemens TIA Openness User Group

Usage

Project configuration

The extension only writes project-scoped files in the first workspace folder. User-level files (for example the VS Code user mcp.json or claude_desktop_config.json) are never touched.

These are the clients that run in VS Code or a VS Code fork, where this extension can be installed: GitHub Copilot, the Claude Code extension, Cursor and the Codex IDE extension. Cursor installs extensions from Open VSX, so this extension has to be installed there from the .vsix file unless it is published on Open VSX.

Notes on single clients:

• Only GitHub Copilot expands ${workspaceFolder}. For GitHub Copilot the export path is written exactly as you enter it. For Anthropic Claude, Cursor and OpenAI Codex ${workspaceFolder} is replaced by the absolute path of the workspace folder, because these clients pass it to the server unchanged. Relative and absolute paths are written as entered for all clients; prefer an absolute path, since a relative one depends on the working directory the client starts the server in.

• When you run the command again, the arguments of the first existing entry are offered as defaults. If that is a non-Copilot file, the export path is already absolute.

• Claude Code asks for approval the first time it sees a project-scoped server. Codex only loads .codex\config.toml for trusted projects.

Add server

• After installation restart VS Code.

• Run the command TIA Portal: Add MCP Server Configuration and tick the clients (checkboxes) you want to configure, then press Enter. The questions are asked once and the files of all ticked clients are written.

• Before the list is shown, the extension looks at the config files of all clients. Clients that already contain the server entry are ticked and marked (already configured) (in Remove as well), and the arguments of the first entry found are the default answers of the questions, even if you tick a different client. A file that cannot be parsed is ignored at this point and reported when you select its client.

• Arguments the existing entry does not have are taken from the args section (project, software-path, export-path) of <export path>/tia.json, if that file exists (tia init of the server writes it). It is looked up in the export path of the existing entry, otherwise in ${workspaceFolder}\Project. A value of the existing entry always wins, and a file that is missing or invalid is ignored.

• Answer the prompts (press Esc to cancel, nothing is written then). Values from an existing entry, or else from tia.json, are offered as defaults:

  1. TIA Portal major version (--tia-major-version)

  2. Project or session file (--project-path)

  3. PLC software path (--software-path), e.g. PC-System_1/Software PLC_1

  4. Export path (--export-path), default ${workspaceFolder}\Project (kept for GitHub Copilot, resolved to the absolute folder for the other clients)

  5. Preserve path structure (--preserve-path)

  6. Allow write access to the project (--allow-write), default No. The flag is only written if you answer Yes.

• Check the written file (GitHub Copilot example below). Other servers and settings in the file are kept.

  • <user>: Your Windows username

  • <version>: The version of the extension you have installed.

  {
      "servers": {
          "vscode-tiaportal-mcp": {
              "type": "stdio",
              "command": "c:\\Users\\<user>\\.vscode\\extensions\\jheilingbrunner.vscode-tiaportal-mcp-<version>\\srv\\net48\\TiaMcpServer.exe",
              "args": [
                  "--tia-major-version", "21",
                  "--project-path", "D:\\Siemens\\Projects\\MyProject\\MyProject.ap21",
                  "--software-path", "PC-System_1/Software PLC_1",
                  "--export-path", "${workspaceFolder}\\Project",
                  "--preserve-path",
                  "--allow-write"
              ],
              "env": {}
          }
      }
  }

  The Anthropic Claude and Cursor entries look the same under "mcpServers" (Cursor has no "type" field), but with an absolute --export-path such as "E:\\Work\\MyWorkspace\\Project".

• Comments and trailing commas in the JSON files, and comments in config.toml, are allowed and are kept when the entry is added, updated or removed. If a file is not valid JSON or TOML the command stops with an error instead of overwriting it.

Use the server

• GitHub Copilot: open GitHub Copilot, switch to Agent mode, check the tools by Select Tools and start to chat with TIA Portal.

• Anthropic Claude: start Claude Code in the workspace folder and approve the project-scoped server vscode-tiaportal-mcp when asked (check with /mcp).

• Other clients: open the workspace folder in the tool; see its own MCP documentation for listing and enabling servers.

Remove server

• Run the command TIA Portal: Remove MCP Server Configuration and tick the clients (checkboxes) to remove the mcp server entry from their config files. The files of clients that are not ticked are not touched.

tia.json: the export formats of TIA Portal

TIA Portal exports each kind of object in the format set under Options > Settings > Version control interface > Export formats: SIMATIC SD documents (.s7dcl, .s7res), SimaticML (.xml) or a source file. Openness cannot read that setting (the settings tree it offers has no export formats), so the server keeps the formats in a plain, visible file at the root of the export folder:

<exportPath>/tia.json

It is one file for all PLCs below <exportPath>, because the setting is global. It is meant to be kept and committed together with the export, so everyone who works with the folder uses the same formats.

You normally do not write it. The first time a tool needs it and it does not exist, the server creates it with the defaults TIA Portal offers for a new workspace:

{
  "version control interface": {
    "code blocks-LAD": "SIMATIC SD(.s7dcl, .s7res)",
    "code blocks-FBD": "SIMATIC SD(.s7dcl, .s7res)",
    "code blocks-SCL": "SIMATIC SD(.s7dcl, .s7res)",
    "code blocks-STL": ".awl",
    "data blocks": "SIMATIC SD(.s7dcl, .s7res)",
    "safety data blocks (F-DBs)": "SIMATIC SD(.s7dcl, .s7res)",
    "PLC data types": "SIMATIC SD(.s7dcl, .s7res)",
    "F-compliant PLC data types (UDT)": "SIMATIC SD(.s7dcl, .s7res)"
  }
}

Available file formats per object type; the first one listed is the default of a new file:

License

MIT