What’s New in WordPress 3.0?

Whoa! No need to get excited! WordPress 3.0 hasn’t been released yet.

But, here is a sneak preview of the features that will be included in the upcoming release of WordPress on May 1, 2010. The expected features are pretty cool as they will make an already robust CMS more effective and efficient.

WordPress Merged with WP-MU

As most of us already know that WordPress MU allows users to run multiple sites under one installation. In the upcoming release, WordPress MU will be merged into the WordPress Core. So, from now on, you will be able to run more than one site/blog from a single installation of WordPress. Here is a screenshot of what to expect :-

Choose your own Username/Password

This is a feature that I have always wanted from WordPress. From version 3.0, whenever you install WordPress, you will be able to choose your own username and password. You will no longer have to accept “admin” for the username and a randomly generated password.

Custom Post Types

Until now, you could only add posts or pages to your WordPress blog. This feature will give you power to create content of any type that you want. For example, you can have Portfolio listings, Products, Catalogs, Library etc. This feature is not going to replace categories or Tags. You will still be able to use categories. Custom Post Types will allow a different way of sorting/displaying your content.

Better Menu Management

This is another feature that was missing in WordPress until now. In the new release, a better menu management has been integrated. This menu system will have a drag and drop functionality that will combine Pages, Categories, and Links. It will also allow the ability of re-ordering, along with sub-menus, and hiding specific Pages or Categories from the menu altogether.

Custom Background Image Support

In Version 3.0, you will be able to manage your background image for the themes. You will be allowed to upload a background image and change its settings (positioning, repeat, attachment). This will save some work for the Theme designers.

A New Default Theme called 2010

The WordPress 3.0 release will be packed with a brand new default theme called 2010. This theme will include Custom header, Custom Background, Clean Design, Multiple Widget Areas, Cascading Menus and a lot more. Overall, it will be a good base to build on for custom themes.

Here is a preview of the theme :- WordPress Theme 2010

Custom Author Templates

In WordPress 3.0, you can create specific templates for every author of your blog.  For example, you will be able to create a author-michael.php or author-123.php, which will be called via the WordPress Template Hierarchy in connection to the author with their nicknames michael or ID 123. Now it will be easy for an author to mark his/her own post or entry with his/her signature.

Canonical Plugins

Have you used a plugin that you loved, and the author discontinued providing support. No bug fixes, no upgrades, and the plugin initially breaks in newer versions. This is a common issue therefore with WordPress 3.0 there is a mission that Jane Wells is carrying which is to unite the plugin authors and come up with canonical plugins. Canonical plugins are developed by a community instead of one developer, so if one person steps down, the plugin does not die.

There are a lot of other improvements that will only be discovered once WordPress 3.0 has been released in public. Here is the official declaration of the changes :-

http://codex.wordpress.org/Version_3.0#Development.2C_Themes.2C_Plugins