Anyway, I just popped into the WordPress dashboard for frugalTheme.com and saw the WordPress update message for 2.8.1 and thought, “Man, I just updated to 2.8?!”  A quick note to all those non-developers out there.  When a software product gets updated that fast, it’s because there was either and awesome new feature that the developers just couldn’t wait to release, or there was a bug that needed fixing and couldn’t really wait for the next ‘normal’ release.  The latter is usually the case.  Even with the frugal Theme, I’ll occasionally run into a glitch that really can’t wait for the next release cycle and I push it out early to effectively address the issue.  So I’m not bashing WordPress here, just giving a little play-by-play.

So when I saw this new update I figured they were addressing this not-so-hot editor feature.  (Search google for ‘wordpress 2.8 slow editor’ or ‘wordpress 2.8 editor not working’ etc… and you’ll see that there was already some complaining going on.)  After the update finished (a process that is now silky smooth, I might add…YOU GO WordPress! ) I went straight to the WordPress Editor.  Sure enough, the simple, old, reliable verison was there and the new one was no where to be found.  That new car smell was gone, but I was happy to get my old buddy back.

Hopefully Matt-and-company are working on a better new WordPress editor, as I really liked the idea.  This time I just hope they’ll wait a bit longer to release it.  At least not until it’s functioning as fast and smooth as the rest of their great software product.

Eric

When I first saw this I was excited to see the new features of this latest version of WordPress.  So I clicked the upgrade link and within seconds I was working off of 2.8.  The only thing required to finish the upgrade process was a re-login to WordPress.  You’ll notice that if you try and move to another page in WordPress you will be brought to the login screen.  Just login and you’re good to go.

From what I’ve read and now from my personal experience, it’s pretty clear that most of the updates are in the user interface and not the actual inner-workings of WordPress.  This is a good thing for theme designers and plugin creators as there is much less chance of major glitches occurring in the update process.

frugal and WordPress 2.8 quickly became friends

The first thing I wanted to make sure of was that WordPress played nice with frugal.  So I upgraded many of my development sites running off the latest versions of the frugal WordPress Theme and found no glitches whatsoever. I even ran a few fresh installs, played with the plugins and put it through its paces for a few days and have yet to see any issues.  From what I’ve heard and read, leading up to this latest Wordperss release, there shouldn’t be much of a transition headache and many designers and users are very grateful for this.

New Features

The biggest changes, as I mentioned, are in the user interface of your WordPress Dashboard.  First and foremost, the plugin area has been completely redone. Now, instead of having to jump between screens to add your widgets to various widgetized locations, you can do all this from one window.  HOW NICE!   Also, you can now use all widgets as many times as you’d like.  Before, some would restrict themselves to one use per site, but this is thankfully no longer the case.

Then we have the new Theme Browser.  This, just like the recently added plugin browser, allows you to easily peruse many of the freely available WordPress Theme and easily install them right from your WordPress Dashboard.  I’m sure many will find this to be quite a useful addition to WordPress.

Next, if you ever play with your WordPress Theme’s code using the WordPress Editor, you’ll now find an actual code editor that uses syntax and everything!   But this is actually my only real gripe with WordPress 2.8 as well.  If you play with it for even a few short minutes, you’ll find that it is much slower than the old editor.  I mean annoyingly slow.  I guess its new capabilities come with a speed price, but after using it I’m questioning its usefulness.  Before, the only reason I would use it was because it was super convenient to just pop in a make a few changes.  Now I’m finding myself using my FTP program to open the theme files in my local code editor and completely bypassing the new WordPress offering.  Who knows, maybe it’s just me or maybe it will be fixed down the road, but for now, it’s my only negative experience with the changes of WordPress 2.8.

The other additions are subtle, but very useful.  Every page has new screen options that let you adjust the amount of options and number of columns that show on the screen.  As mentioned in the video below, some like less clutter and other like more options per page.  This gives you the ability to choose what works best for YOU.

Final Thoughts

Overall, I’ve been very pleased with WordPress 2.8.  Not a lot of scary changes to bring down our blogs with bugs and the changes that were made seem to be very worthwhile and well implemented.  Other than the slow new editor, I’m finding little to complain about and a lot to appreciate.

Be careful making any update to your WordPress setup, but from what I’ve seen thus far, upgrading to WordPress 2.8 shouldn’t be too much of a concern.

Below is the video from WordPress.org that shows these new features in a unique, WordPress esque fassion.  You’ll also find a link to the video and announcement of the WordPress 2.8 release.

Eric

2.8 Release Jazzes Themes and Widgets