One of the downsides of writing a bunch of posts ahead of time and obsessively sticking to a posting schedule, is that when something big happens you end up being a little late to the party. And I wish WordPress 3.0 hadn’t been released during the World Cup – there is just too many big things happening in too many of my interests all at once.
WordPress 3.0 has finally been released. I haven’t installed it on this site yet but I did install one of the betas on a test site a couple of weeks ago. There are some things that I really like but I think that developers are going to be more excited about it than the average user.
Here are some of the major features.
- WordPress and WordPress MU have merged – WordPress MU is the multi-user version of WordPress, which means multiple blogs can be installed with one WordPress installation. This feature does not work out of the box and must be enabled. There is a tutorial here.
- New default theme called Twenty-Ten. I really like this theme. The old default theme was getting tired and this one is super easy to customize and make look more unique. The header and colors are changeable. The theme also features footer widgets, which has been a more popular feature recently and won’t have to be coded in separately.
- Custom Menu Management – this means that navigation menus can be customized and made up of specific posts, pages, categories, tags and links. This means that an article like mine about excluding a page from the top navigation will no longer be necessary because you will be able to build your own custom menus.
- Help under every section in the WordPress admin
- When WordPress is installed can now set username and password immediately
- Improved Custom Post Types and Custom Taxonomies – this is an entire topic, which would need to be discussed in a separate article
- Slightly lighter color scheme in the WordPress admin
- If the site has been marked as private, there will be a message about Search Engines being blocked at the top of the screen so it doesn’t get left that way permanently.
- When editing posts can remove all tags at once.
- Settings > Miscellaneous has been removed and integrated with Settings > Media – good! This makes a lot more sense logically.
Here is a video of the highlights.
You can read about all of the changes in the WordPress codex. There is also a great overview at Digging Into WordPress.
I discovered an article that lists the most common upgrade problems and fixes for them. As I’ve said many times, I’m not a fan of the auto-upgrade feature – my manual upgrade guide still works great. Be sure to backup and make sure that your plugins and theme are compatible with the new version.
photo credit: deadstardro
Thanks for the linking Kim!
WP 3.0, in terms of security, is good. But am not amused by this version, something is missing, but can’t able to figure it out.. :D
Hi – Thanks for your article :-)
Interesting that something bothers me. Let me know if you figure out what it is.
Well, I think I need to rephrase that one, I expected more features in that version, but sadly it didn’t.
P.S. Sorry for replying after 4 months. :|
I upgraded one site manually and one automatically and they both seem to be working fine, so far. =)
Love the idea of the custom menus, but I haven’t played with it yet.
.-= Christine´s last blog ..Wonder Women? =-.
Hi Christine – That’s great! I haven’t much time with the menus either. Things are going to quiet down for me a little after today so I might have some time to spend with it.
A list of bugs is awesome. I still ain’t gin’ there until at least 3.1 or .2, which should be somewhere around next week. LOL
Now the custom footer section; this is what I really want on my current custom theme, instead of the boxes already there.
.-= Dennis Edell | Direct Sales Marketing´s last blog ..Sub Categories and Drop Down Menus – What’s the Deal? =-.
You’ll have a long time to wait if 3.1 is what you’re after. See “The Future” section at http://wordpress.org/development/2010/06/thelonious/
.-= Ari Herzog´s last blog ..Why You Write and Read =-.
Hi Ari – That’s interesting. I wonder if there is some huge bug or problem whether they will patch it or not. But 3.0 seems pretty solid from a security wise.
I’m very sorry to hear (read) that. I guess we’ll be waiting quite a while for all the bugs that WILL pop in to be fixed then, huh.
.-= Dennis Edell | Direct Sales Marketing´s last blog ..Blog Network Almost Ready to Rise – Multiple Posts Coming Here. =-.
Hi Dennis – I don’t think there will be a 3.1 for awhile – WordPress says they are taking a release cycle off. The footer widgets are great but they are on the default theme – they won’t work with just any theme.
“If the site has been marked as private, there will be a message about Search Engines being blocked at the top of the screen so it doesn’t get left that way permanently.”
useful. I had a new client, a few months ago, who couldn’t figure out why their blog wasn’t appearing in the SERPs. I figured fairly quickly that it was marked as private, but with this new WP feature, they would have figured it out sooner.
.-= vered – blogger for hire´s last blog ..Be Kind To Your Behind =-.
Hi Vered – I find that many of us it’s the little features that we find more useful than the big ones. In the 2.9 release I was so happy that it would say post scheduled rather than post published when I scheduled a post.
thanks for posting this… I’ve been waiting to upgrade to see how it fares. probably won’t be until next weekend… maybe a newer version will be out by then!
Hi – I usually wait a week or two before upgrading. I like to see what issues people are having and often a new release comes out when I just don’t have the time.
I have used the beta version of 3.0 and didn’t have any problems with it.
We upgraded when I told myself I would wait until 3.1 or 3.01! Except for one minor glitch things went well. One plugin I was looking to see if there was any word on it’s compatibility with 3.0 was the plugin Lucia’s Linky Love. I’ve been using it for quite some time now and there hasn’t been an upgrade in a few years! Keeping fingers crossed it does not cause any problems with 3.0
.-= Colleen´s last blog ..Full Disclosure =-.
Hi Colleen – It’s a shame when I good plugin stops being developed. Hopefully it will keep working with 3.0.
It’s my understanding that it isn’t even available for download anymore.
I switched from Lucias to NoFollowFree – http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/nofollow-free/ – same functionality of Lucias and then some. :)
.-= Dennis Edell | Direct Sales Marketing´s last blog ..Blog Network Almost Ready to Rise – Multiple Posts Coming Here. =-.
I am yet to take a call on this. Probably after validating my self developed theme. But, if things get complicated, I plan to go for a theme like Thesis thereby outsourcing my headache to them lol
.-= Ajith Edassery´s last blog ..Are you selling your stocks at the wrong time? =-.
Hi Ajith – Well, sooner or later you will want to upgrade. I was using it some today and I really liked it.
Did you face any issue with the theme? I am too lazy to even upgrade and discover issues later.. I don’t want to fix the theme again lol
.-= Ajith Edassery´s last blog ..AdSense Clicks but No Earnings =-.
Hi Ajith – I haven’t upgraded this site yet. I haven’t had time to deal with any issues that might crop up. So far, I’ve only used it with brand new installations.
wew, I have installed wordpress 3.0 but do not know if there are facilities like that. Just be advised, newbie: lol:
btw, i see some bug at content editor, hopefully can be fixed in the next update
Hi Adhi – What is the bug?
I really like the new WordPress 3.0. I actually switched to using the basic theme that comes with it instead of the Copyblogger theme that I had. This generic theme seems to be even better. The layout is great and I really like the simplicity of it all.
.-= Kathy´s last blog ..Shameless Self Promotion =-.
Hi Kathy – I really like the new default theme. It looks good and it’s easy to quickly customize it.
I installed 3.0 on 1 of my blogs but there was a lot of issues with some of my plugins and the new version. I decided I would wait until the plugins were updated to work before updating my other sites.
.-= Tracy´s last blog ..It’s Funky- Freaky Friday- Fashion’s Oddest Finds- Right Here- =-.
Hi Tracy – What plugins were you having problems with? It’s always good to have a list. So far, I’ve only run into a problem with the Redirection plugin and an issue with the Thesis theme.
i’ve updated my blog to 3.0 but a lot of plugin doesnt work again and my theme looks awful.. now trying the new themes to fit my blog
.-= rainer´s last blog ..Windows 7 God Mode =-.
Hi Rainer – Which plugins were causing problems?