Getting to grips with Wordpress 2.5
I came across the announcement of Wordpress 2.5 at the weekend on Daily Blog Tips and decided to upgrade all my blogs with this new version. As usual the update was quick and painless and from what I have seen in the last few days, 2.5 has to be the release with the most changes in some time.
The first thing that you notice is the cosmetic changes in the admin area. Everything has been tidied up to give the wordpress script a more professional feel about it. Don’t worry, it won’t take you long to find where everything is as the top nav links are pretty much the same (albeit the settings, plugins and users links are tucked away at the top right hand side).
My favourite new feature is the add media functions. They have added functionality to align your images more easily (I used to always add this myself) and adding youtube videos is much easier too with the ‘add video’ link. As you can see from the image below, the new media buttons are integrated into your editor (compared to the upload image feature in older versions which was underneath the post area).
The main user changes in the script (according to WP) are :
- Cleaner, faster, less cluttered dashboard
- Dashboard Widgets
- Multi-file upload with progress bar
- Bonus: EXIF extraction
- Search posts and pages
- Tag management
- Password strength meter
- Concurrent editing protection
- Few-click plugin upgrades
- Friendlier visual post editor
- Built-in galleries
The developer changes include :
- Salted passwords
- Secure cookies
- Easy taxonomy and URL creation
- Inline documentation
- Database optimization
- Media buttons
- Shortcode API
I normally upload the latest version of Wordpress to a test blog first and test everything before uploading it to my main blogs but I’m glad I took the risk and uploaded 2.5 to all my blogs as I haven’t had any problems and the new features have definately improved WordPress’s functionality. My advice is to backup your blog’s files and database and get upgrading!
Thanks again to Daniel Scocco for the heads up on this on Saturday.
Links :
Wordpress 2.5 announcements at Wordpress.org
Wordpress Download Page
Chris Jacobson | March 31st, 2008 at 11:11 am #
Did you have any problems uploading photos since using 2.5? I was getting a HTTP error until I research the WP forums and found that you had to tweak the .htaccess file for photo uploads to work properly. That was the only problem I experienced. Other than that, I really like 2.5
Kevin | March 31st, 2008 at 11:30 am #
Hi Chris. No I’ve not had any problems with uploading images (or anything else for that matter)
Andy MacDonald | March 31st, 2008 at 12:07 pm #
I really love the new version of wordpress, however ive had problems with the visual display where you enter your post in wordpress. Ive posted to their support boards but still haven’t had replies so ive had to downgrade again.
The toolbar where you can style your post etc doesn’t appear for me, i thought this maybe a glitch but after uploading a fresh version of wordpress i had no problems. The problem only appears when i import my database which is odd. Id really love to use the new wordpress but this one problem is forcing me to use the older version, which is annoying but that’s life i guess.
Kevin | March 31st, 2008 at 12:13 pm #
strange that you are getting that problem. I have older versions of wordpress on my computer but if you haven’t backed up your database that won’t be much help.
Can you explain your problem in more details?
Andy MacDonald | March 31st, 2008 at 12:22 pm #
take a look at this post over at the wordpress forums mate. i have also uploaded a screenshot so you can take a look.
http://wordpress.org/support/topic/164885?replies=1#post-719082
Kevin | March 31st, 2008 at 12:33 pm #
Go to the users section in your blog panel and then go to your profile and unclick the visual editor (where it says ‘Use the visual editor when writing’).
Does the basic editor work?
Andy MacDonald | March 31st, 2008 at 12:50 pm #
ill have to re-upload the 2.5 wordpress.ill check it out and post back shortly.
Andy MacDonald | March 31st, 2008 at 2:06 pm #
All sorted Kev. Cheers mate.
Danny | March 31st, 2008 at 3:50 pm #
I’m not getting the ‘add media’ bar on my write screen…help