A few weeks ago WordPress unleashed 3.1 to the web. Here at Microsoft we have a fondness for versions 3.1. We also have a fondness for codenames. So the fourteenth version of WordPress AKA Reinhardt AKA 3.1 is now available for download or upgrade. We at Ubelly run WordPress on Windows so we like this announcement. In addition to some miscellaneous improvements such as a streamlined interface, new blue colour scheme for admin panels and over 820 bug fixes below is a list of the new stuff we’re rather fond of.
New Admin Bar
You might be familiar with this from WordPress.com – you can basically have the frontend of your site/blog connect to the backend: set the bar to appear within the admin screens or at the top of the website (if you run the wp_footer() function). A good way of navigating multi-site installs in particular – Matt Mullenweg calls this “the first step toward a front-end editor”.
Post Formats
This one’s my favourite, specify the format of a particular post so when you’ve got images, video, audio, a link list and a bunch more types to customise the presentation of the content. Basically made up of pure meta information this allows users to feel confident that whatever content type they’re playing with will render nicely on the page. A bit like Custom Taxonomies, but much 
simpler to use.
John O’Nolan (designer extraordinaire (just check out his arm) and member of the WordPress UI team) agrees: “I think Post Formats are a really exciting part of WordPress 3.1. Over the last couple of years posts classed by content type (audio, text, video, etc) have become increasingly popular and, with WordPress 3.1, it’s now easier than ever to create custom presentation styles for different types of posts. I think this is going to have a big impact on how WordPress themes for bloggers are created. The new front-end admin bar is also a fantastic feature – I think people are going to be surprised at just how useful it is!”
Internal Page Linking
This one’s great for SEO: Search through your database for the post and link to it, using the Visual Post Editor. Previously you had to actually search for the URL using your browser on the man nav.
enter pages!
Yep – you can now type in the page number or sort by columns. Simple, but effective, trust us.
Easiest yet to get going with
Last week it was announced that you can get 3.1 as a simple install through the Microsoft Web Platform Installer (WebPI) – it’s crazy simple; we hear Peter Westwood had something to do with making this happen – so thanks!
How to get it
Click here to get WordPress 3.1 now, or check out the WordPress blog for more info.
