A method of providing a control software configuration for a module of a modular plant, the method including, in a module engineering phase: receiving a user definition for the module; and automatically generating the control software configuration for the module based on the user definition, the automatically generating including: specifying parameters for the module that are not specific to any target system; and providing the control software configuration as a controller-agnostic configuration file for subsequent binding of controller software instantiated according to the controller-agnostic configuration file to a hardware controller of the module when the module is integrated into a target system during a plant engineering phase.