WordPress 3.0 is coming

Monday, April 19th, 2010 at 8:11 am

WordPress released the first beta version of the next upgrade to the software. There are a lot of changes coming and I am starting to review some of the changes I have been liking in using the beta version.

You can find out more here. I would not use a beta version on any of your regular blogs but you can set up a test blog like I have done if you like to play and test out the newest versions.

First they have changed the default theme from the long used Kubrick. There are a lot of changes inside to the themes to take advantage of some of the new features. You can see this on my beta blog.

Today I will talk about some of the appearance changes. One of the new changes is that there are new menu options. You can now have drop down menus. I added one on the blog so that if you go to the about link a drop down menu will display below it. This will not work with all themes as it has to be coded properly. Theme authors will need to update their themes to take advantage of this new feature.

I will write more about how to do it when it is actually launched.

They have added the ability to update your themes like you can with your plugins now. When you go to the upgrade page under tools you will now see three categories.

Now the upgrade page will list all of your themes that have an update just like version 2.9.2 has for plugins.

update-themes

The next item is killer for me. If you ever do custom coding to your theme and have lost it when upgrading there is support for child themes. This allows you to make changes that will not be overwritten when you upgrade the theme. You can find out more about using child themes here.

These are just a couple of the upcoming changes coming in WordPress 3.0 and I will be writing more about the other changes as the release gets nearer. Tentative release is for next month some time but as always will depend upon the testing results.

On another note this has been a rarity as I have yet to have a plugin compatibility issue for the plugins I use and recommend. A good sign as it has been a while since WordPress did a major version change that it has not effected my plugins.

About the author

Mike Paetzold got started blogging in 2003 and has become an expert on using WordPress. He has become known as The WordPress Guy.

After being an under ground niche marketer using his blogs he has surfaced to share some of the ways he uses blogs to enter various niches profitably.

If you would like help in building your business check out my coaching offer.