PLCnext Engineer Hardware Configuration

Hello,
I have the following question:
I have developed a project which depends on a .pcwex file and a visual studio solution library.
My problem is that I use this project with many different configurations.
What I mean with „configurations“ is this:
Sometimes I use profinet accessories and sometimes default AXL Smartelements Inputs/Outputs.
Depending on the client I also configure different IP settings on the components.
And even sometimes I use this project with a controller 2152 and sometimes with a controller 3152.

This creates the following problems:
I have a demo hardware at my company on which I do all the development. But when it is time to upgrade an existing client installation I have to reconfigure the whole project on the client setup. This of course is prone to human error.
Also, when I replace a 3152 controller with a 2152 controller the GDS Port List get disconnected and I have to connect all the variables from scratch. (This problem also happens if I have to replace the same controller with a different firmware.
Is there any suggestion to optimize this problem somehow?
Can I have the plcnext engineer project have many different controllers inside? Each one for each client with different setups but keep a common IEC 61131-3 Variables/HMIWebServer/AlarmServer/OPCUA? Something like this would make this a lot easier to maintain.
How can I handle this process more efficiently?
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Hi dimitrismvrm,
the GDS ports shouldn’t be disconnected when replacing the controller. I’m using PLCnext Engineer 2025.6 and with my small test project I was able to replace the AXC F 2152 v2025.0 with a v2025.6 and from there I replaced it with an AXC F 3152 v2025.6 and it kept my GDS port connection intact (from an IEC program to a PN device).
I’d put the common IEC and HMI stuff in a library. As for the GDS Ports and the AlarmServer there is a CSV Import/Export that might help. OPC UA… dunno what can be done there.

BR
DivisionByZero

Maybe it has to do with the fact that the GDS Ports are referring to a program that I have created using C#?