WordPress 3.3 was released yesterday.

Experienced users will appreciate the new drag-and-drop uploader, hover menus for the navigation, the new toolbar, improved co-editing support, and the new Tumblr importer. We’ve also been thinking a ton about what the WordPress experience is like for people completely new to the software. Version 3.3 has significant improvements there with pointer tips for new features included in each update, a friendly welcome message for first-time users, and revamped help tabs throughout the interface. Finally we’ve improved the dashboard experience on the iPad and other tablets with better touch support.

Of course that means today was update day. All done, painlessly, in less than half an hour.

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{EAV_BLOG_VER:ee8cce029d54b69b}

The code above is for Empire Avenue to verify that I am the owner of bRight&Early. Well that’s not a very exciting post. Let me tell you a bit about Empire Avenue.

From their about page:

Empire Avenue is the Social Stock Market, where you can Grow your Social Capital online. Here’s how it works, you get to discover valuable, interesting, cool, fun people online and then based scores or share price, invest virtual currency in their profiles by buying shares in our Social Stock Market. It’s boatloads of fun, and that simple act of buying shares in someone you think is worth your currency, you will create new connections and as people invest in you, grow your own social capital and get more value in and out of your networks!

EAve is a lot of fun. If you look on the sidebar you can see how my stock is doing. I’m trading at 24.831 this morning, up .494 – not bad for my third day. Look for (and invest in) me on Empire Avenue. My stock symbol is JIMBRICK.

As you know, social media sites are huge, and only getting bigger. I’m going to explore it at my bRight & Early backup site on WordPress. Visit that site to discuss social media.

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Things are picking up. Thank you to those who have donated. A special thanks to those who are spreading the word on Twitter, Facebook, G+, etc. It all helps.

You may have noticed this:

It’s a WordPress plugin called the Oliometer, made for things like this.

Thanks again. Off to find some stuff to post about.

If you can…

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WordPress has released version 3.2 with some really big changes. And not just a few changes, a ton of changes.

The first big changes are the requirements. With this version you must have PHP 5.2.4 or greater (old requirement – since WordPress 2.5 was PHP 4.3 or greater) and MySQL 5.0.15 or greater (old requirement – since WordPress 2.9 was MySQL 4.1.2 or greater).

They have also dropped support for IE 6 and have started the end of life process for IE7.

One of the most noticeable changes, if you choose to use it, is Distraction Free Writing mode.You can access this via the Toggle Fullscreen mode tool in the Visual editor and fullscreen button in the HTML editor. When you do, you are presented with a virtually blank page without all of the buttons, meta boxes and links. It’s just you and your words. However, if you need your most common functions you simply have to move your mouse to the top of the page to add a link or media.

There is also a new default theme, Twenty Eleven. You can read about the many other enhancements on the WordPress 3.2 Codex page.

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I’ve mentioned previously that I have a site set up to test the new versions of WordPress that are in development. I like to see what’s coming. One of the features slated to be a part of WordPress 3.2 is “Distraction Free Writing”. Find out what Distraction Free Writing is all about. I think you’ll like it.

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The latest version of WordPress, version 3.1, has been released. Here are some of the new and improved features.

• Internal Linking – click a button for an internal link and it allows you to search for a post or browse a list of existing content and select it for inclusion.
• Admin Bar – contains various links to useful admin screens. By default, the admin bar is displayed when a user is logged in and visiting the site and is not displayed in admin screens for single blog installs. For multisite installs, the admin bar is displayed both when visiting the site and in the admin screens.
• Streamlined Writing Interface – new users of WordPress will find the write screen much less cluttered than before, as more of the options are hidden by default. You can click on Screen Options in the top right to bring them back.
• Post Formats – meta information that can be used by themes to customize presentation of a post. Read more in the article Post Formats.
• Network Admin – move Super Admin menus and related pages out of the regular admin and into a new Network Admin screen.
• List-type Admin Screens – sortable columns for list-type screens and better pagination.
• Exporter/Importer Overhaul – many under the hood changes including adding author information, better handling for taxonomies and terms, and proper support for navigation menus.
• Custom Content Type Improvements – allows developers to generate archive pages, and have better menu and capability controls. Read more in the article Post Types.
• Advanced Queries – allows developers to query multiple taxonomies and custom fields.
• Refreshed Blue Admin Color Scheme – puts the focus more squarely on your content.

Upgrading was easy, as expected. It only took about 30 minutes to complete all of my blogs. It’s going to take a while longer to take advantage of all the new features.

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I am thinking about a new look for bRight & Early. One theme under consideration is up on my sandbox site. Please take a look and let me know what you think. Add your comments here and/or vote in the poll in the sidebar.

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WordPress has released version 3.0, completing over 1200 tickets worth of fixes, enhancements, and new features. Here are just a few of the new features:

• WordPress and WordPress MU have merged, allowing the management of multiple sites (called Multisite) from one WordPress installation.
• New default theme “Twenty Ten” takes full advantage of the current features of WordPress.
• New custom menu management feature, allows creation of custom menus combining posts, pages, categories, tags, and links for use in theme menus or widgets.
• Ability to set the admin username and password during installation.
• Bulk updating of themes with an automatic maintenance mode during the process.
• Improved Custom post types and custom taxonomies including hierarchical (category-style) support

And that is just a taste. Here is a short video to give you a quick overview.

I’ve already deployed 3.0 to nine sites, two of them multisite, and the process took less than an hour. The process of using some of the new features is going to take a bit longer. Enjoy.

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WordPress is getting ready for the next major release — 3.0 and the first beta version is now available.

You can see it in action at my test setup, and read about a few of the new features.

After a week or so of testing and fixing they will push out a second beta, and then, after a short period to test that, the new version will be available.

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While it has only been a short time since the release of WordPress 2.9, some discovered issues created the need for the release of WordPress 2.9.1

This release addresses a handful of minor issues as well as a rather annoying problem where scheduled posts and pingbacks are not processed correctly due to incompatibilities with some hosts.

You can download the current version, or upgrade right from your blog admin area using Tools -> Upgrade.

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