It's a great achievement for WordPress 2.8 to be released so soon after 2.7. Named 'Baker', 2.8 adds plenty of new features, including syntax highlighting for theme/plugin editing, a theme installer, and a great revamped widgets interface and API.
1. Dashboard Columns
You can now sort your dashboard into columns, which is a great feature for those who are small or large on screen space. You can set up to 4 columns and drag and drop different widgets. I found it to be a good feature as I like re-arrange my dashboard and management pages to suit my workspace. This will surely appeal to many users.
2. Password Reminder
Just installed WordPress? This is the feature for those that forget to change their admin account password after a fresh install. It displays a big notice across the top of the admin area until you change it.
3. Theme Installer
In WordPress 2.7, you could install plugins directly through your installation. Now, the same feature has been ported to themes, allowing you to install any theme directory into your WordPress site. Installing is as easy as installing plugins -- through the click of a button.
4. Theme/Plugin Editor - Syntax Highlighter & Function Reference
This is a feature that I've been looking forward to, along with many other developers. WordPress now has syntax highlighting thanks to CodePress. This means you can find functions and browse through code much easier, as you would with your code editor.
You'll also find a Documentation lookup, as so you can quickly reference WordPress functions through the Codex. These new features will speed up development of WordPress themes even further by having the tools right in front of you for quick & easy access.
5. Widgets Interface
WordPress' widgets management interface was a bit plain and simple. That's no longer true with the brand new widgets interface allowing you to sort and manage your theme's widgets more efficiently. It still uses the drag and drop method of adding/removing widgets, but takes the active/inactive widgets one step further separating them from each other.
6. Widgets API
Creating widgets is now easier than ever before with the new widgets API. All you have to do is extend the basic class and functions, and you can easily create a widget with options and more. Here's an example widget using the new API; it's been coded to allow the user to set the title, but display predefined content.
<?php
/*
Plugin Name: Example Widget
Plugin URI:
Description: An example widget using the WordPress 2.8 Widget API.
Version: 1.0.0
Author: Andrew Turner
Author URI: http://andrew-turner.com
*/
class exWidget extends WP_Widget {
/* Constructs Widget */
function exWidget() {
parent::WP_Widget(false, $name = 'exWidget');
}
/* Widget Base */
function widget($args, $instance) {
extract( $args );
?>
<?php echo $before_widget; ?>
<?php echo $before_title
. $instance['title']
. $after_title; ?>
<?php echo 'Hello There!' ?>
<?php echo $after_widget; ?>
<?php
}
function update($new_instance, $old_instance) {
return $new_instance;
}
/* Options Form */
function form($instance) {
$title = esc_attr($instance['title']);
?>
<p><label for="<?php echo $this->get_field_id('title'); ?>"><?php _e('Title:'); ?> <input class="widefat" id="<?php echo $this->get_field_id('title'); ?>" name="<?php echo $this->get_field_name('title'); ?>" type="text" value="<?php echo $title; ?>" /></label></p>
<?php
}
}
/* Register Widget */
add_action('widgets_init', create_function('', 'return register_widget("exWidget");'));
?>
7. Timezones and DST
WordPress now supports timezones, and the ability to automatically update when it comes around to daylight savings. This is a new feature, and was not found in previous versions.
8. Custom Taxonomies
A Taxonomy is essentially a way that things are grouped or divided. WordPress 2.8 improves upon its Taxonomies by allowing you to develop your own. By default, WordPress includes three of its own.
- category
- post_tag
- link_category
Uses for custom taxonomies might include making post series or more. Here's an example of creating a custom taxonomy, the code is placed in your theme's functions.php file.
<?php
add_action( 'init', 'custom_taxonomies', 0 );
function custom_taxonomies() {
register_taxonomy( 'version', 'post', array( 'hierarchical' => false, 'label' => 'Version', 'query_var' => true, 'rewrite' => true ) );
register_taxonomy( 'released', 'post', array( 'hierarchical' => true, 'label' => 'Released', 'query_var' => true, 'rewrite' => true ) );
register_taxonomy( 'downloads', 'post', array( 'hierarchical' => false, 'label' => 'Downloads', 'query_var' => true, 'rewrite' => true ) );
}
?>
To understand how to create your own taxonomy, you need to understand what's behind the code. Here's a breakdown of the following example:
register_taxonomy( 'version', 'post', array( 'hierarchical' => false, 'label' => 'Version', 'query_var' => true, 'rewrite' => true ) );
- version : Tells WordPress the name of your taxonomy.
- post : Tells WordPress what type of content this applies to; you could apply your taxonomy to pages or even links if you wanted too. Though WordPress handles custom taxonomies with posts best.
- hierarchical : Asks whether the taxonomy's terms can be shown in a hierarchy (A hierarchy is setup like a tree of items, eg: categories.). You can set this to true for the terms to be organized like categories, or false for them to behave like tags.
- label : The name of your taxonomy that will be seen in the WordPress admin for posts, pages or links.
- query_var : A parameter that lets WordPress know if you want to retrieve your posts through a query -- for example showing all posts which relate to the product released in 2008. If you've set your taxonomy so you can query it, remember the variable for the query will be the name of your taxonomy.
- rewrite : Whether you'd like to allow WordPress to use your permalink structure when viewing the archives or taxonomy page. Eg, instead of yourproduct.net/?released=2008 it could become yourproduct.com/released/2008.
9. Faster Administration Pages
The WordPress team have sped up the administration pages (E.g: Posts, Comments, Settings, etc) through script compression and concatenation. Now, you can perform tasks quicker and easier. Take note of the fact that this feature doesn't apply to the front end of your WordPress website.
10. Plugin Management Updated
The plugin management interface that allows you to activate and deactivate plugins has been updated with a new layout - it still heralds the same features as in WordPress 2.7, but with a different layout. You'll find that they've been put together in a list on the single page, but there's an option to view different statuses such as:
- Active
- Inactive
- Recently Active
- Upgrade Available
WordPress 2.8 brings some great new features to the table - some major and others minor - but they're changes that make using WordPress more efficient, convenient and reliable. Keep an eye out for WordPress 2.9 and beyond as it evolves into what could be one of the best Content-Management-Systems available!
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User Comments
( ADD YOURS )Josh June 19th
AWSOME!
( )Jeff June 19th
Very nice, I have to say. Wordpress is way cool in so many ways. But there a some thing I would make differently. Plus, and I know most people here are PHP lovers, but we are a .net house. We been developing a wordpress like engine for our projects, and have had some decent progress, but wordpress simply amazes me with the development cycles. The guys at Automattic have really put together a good crew.
Anyhow, Good work guys.
( )Vasili June 19th
I’m shocked Harley didn’t do this post. Great list! Loving how Wordpress decided to improve the widget’s integration.
( )Zach Dunn June 19th
One of the things I love so much about this version of Wordpress is how they made so many tiny changes with big impact. Template tags got condensed, the dashboard gets more administrative power, and just generally USEFUL things.
Good list!
( )Andrew Turner June 19th
Exactly, I think WordPress 2.9 and beyond will become even better! Can’t wait for it. Though from 2.8, my favorite features would be the Columns, Plugin/Theme Editor and Timezones.
( )kinta mahadji June 19th
nice article, thanks for sharing with us.
( )Dave June 19th
The new release is great. But Caveat Emptor!!!!! There are a LOT of plugins that won’t work with 2.8. So if you have a critical site, either wait for awhile, or check the WP forums to see if your plugin will cause a 2.8 meltdown! Then a friendly email to the plugin author may get you the satisfaction you need.
You’ve been warned!
I have about 20 WP sites, and I installed 2.8 on my least critical one to check it out. Very few plugins, and everything’s fine.
( )Andrew Turner June 19th
You are right, but chances are plugins built for WP 2.7 won’t break your WP 2.8 site. 2.8 has had no major code base changes.
I have at least 12 websites which i manage that all run on WordPress, which were 2.7. A third of that had at least 10 plugins which are still functioning and haven’t ‘broken’ the websites.
Though, If anyone is unsure of if the plugins they have are compatible check out this website: http://plugincheck.bravenewcode.com
It lists all 5,040 plugins and tell’s you which version of WP they’re compatible with.
( )cubus June 20th
Just upgrade a Wordpress 2.7.1 site with 14 plugins to 2.8, and it worked like a charm.
So, go for that update
Diogok June 19th
Awesome features. WP rocks!
( )xun June 19th
worpdress 2.8 is awesome! hehe. my update bug has resolved. hehe.
( )Shane Sponagle June 19th
Great preview post. and some very cool features… Thanks.
( )Rock Your Web June 19th
Nice article. Good job.
( )Stuart June 19th
Have to update mine when it comes out Andrew….looks good.
( )Meshach June 19th
Nice stuff!!
( )Myfacefriends June 19th
Thiis is a nice stuff, (I’m zero knowledge about wordpress.)
( )Shane June 20th
The best just gets better and better. Thanks for sharing.
( )Hezi June 20th
It’s keep getting better and better. they on the right track to make wordpress the ULTIMATE CMS, not just for blogs – but for any other website as well.
I think it rocks!
Thanks Andrew.
( )Andrew Turner June 20th
It truly is, I’m looking forward to WordPress 2.9 and beyond! I use WordPress for standard sites just for the fact that it’s so extensible and easy to use, I even taught my Grandmother to use WordPress! But none the less, ‘ve got that guit feeling WordPress is destined to become one of the most used and powerful content management systems.
Thanks for the comment on the article, I look forward to possibly having the opportunity to post more on NETTUTS+
( )Daniel Groves June 20th
Updated HiddenCSS yesterday, it really is awesome!
( )Alex Stomp June 20th
Dugg it! ^^
I was already using most of those functions, but I did not know about the custom taxonomy. Thanks A LOT for that, it’ll be very useful, in my case to categorize my form pages together.
Thanks!
( )J Mehmett June 20th
I have posted a collection of tips and tricks related to the new WP2.8 on my blog. All I can say is WordPress 2.8 is more better than 2.7 and is faster than ever before.
( )octagon June 20th
For me the best reason to use WP isn’t even all of the awesome and easy to use features, it’s the fact that the documentation is actually present, accurate and complete. Trying to determine how to do something in a lot of other CMS can be the catalyst to pyromania, and Jebus help you if you complain about that fact to any of the community forums.
Q – “Hey, I can’t help but notice there isn’t any documentation on any of these functions that isn’t from 2 years ago and no longer correct, how do i use function X or accomplish solution Y?”
A – “WAAAAAAAARRRRHGGHGGHGHGH!!!”
( )Dario Gutierrez June 20th
Good news!! Looks great, in my case i like the widgets interfase, theme installer and plugin features. Thanks for this info.
( )Soner Gönül June 20th
WoW thanx! Really cool
( )BestPSTutorials-TR June 20th
Thanks for sharing
( )Lamin Barrow June 20th
I upgraded http://Jqueryshowcase.com to 2.8 just after a few hours of it release. After working with 2.7 for a while, i am really digging the new features of this new release. I will give 10 stars to the new theme installer.
( )Nicholas Z. Cardot June 20th
I just switched to Wordpress and started a blog with it one week ago. I love it so far. It’s very easy to use and has tons of great features!
( )emonweb June 20th
Awesome new features, looking for category/tag support for pages also in the core.
( )evarkadasi June 20th
Really great stuffs, tnx..
( )elinix June 20th
Awesome new features, really gonna help a lot
( )insic June 20th
maybe i need to upgrade mine now.
Nice post
( )dmk June 21st
Couple of good tweaks there to make WP the web designer’s choice for CMS.
( )Aneslin June 21st
yesss, gr8 improvement. specially i like widget dev
( )thc 4 da share
Chaz Hoover June 21st
Pretty good article…
( )Gareth Hardy June 21st
It’s certainly opened my eyes a little! Thanks!
( )Keith D June 21st
I’ve just downloaded 2.8 and was wondering where I could fing information on the new release.
This tutorial is brilliant, just what I was looking for.
The theme installer looks fantastic.
( )Andrew Turner June 21st
What sort if information are you after?
( )Keith D June 28th
Fairly basic info about using the dashboard…. and perhaps a not so basic bit of info… how to transfer my locally developed site to a hosting server.
I’ve Used XAMPP and wordpress 2.8 to develop my site locally and I’m still playing around with things on the dashboard (Wordpress is new to me) and deciding which theme to use, then I will buy a domain name and transfer to hosting server – I’ve no idea how to do the transfer and any help or links to info on how to do it would be much appreciated..
Montana Flynn June 21st
Two things that bother me about 2.8:
1) The syntax highlighter (codepress) does not work in Safari 4
2) The widgets box is hard to use if you have a lot of widgets! On my laptop for example I cant select a bottom widget and drag and drop to the active sidebar. It should scroll down with the page.
Otherwise great post, I think I am going to like using the custom taxonomy for my clients who favor a CMS than blog built with wordpress.
( )BG Website Design June 21st
Nice post! Looks like it’s time for a fresh install!!!
( )Michelle June 21st
very nice… upgrading now. ^__^
( )Sumesh June 21st
I liked most of the features brought in by WP 2.8, perhaps the only problem I can point out is the plugin management page, where they have taken away the highlights for active/inactive plugins and spread it out over three pages. Not a good idea, although it isn’t terrible either (you only use plugin management page so much).
( )rap June 21st
Cool! Makes me wanna upgrade to 2.8. Thanks
( )4web June 22nd
Nice
, thanks
( )Karl Oakes June 22nd
Just starting to use WP as a CMS, can’t wait to upgrade to try out some of these new cool features, thanks for the list.
( )Martyn Web June 22nd
Nice additional features, the team have done really well to launch this so quickly after the initial upgrade to 2.7.
The whole admin panel has so many features now, its great.
( )w1sh June 22nd
Really looking forward to that function ref.
( )wayno007 June 22nd
I like the new widgets API — time to upgrade!
( )Diego SA June 22nd
Yeah, 2.8 rocks!
( )There’s a client of mine who has a blog and I just updated it! Some new features are very useful and has a beautiful look!
Congratulations for Wordpress!
Kasper June 22nd
As usual. Good stuff. Thx
( )Xtence June 22nd
wordpress rules, very userfriendly and now even more, great !
( )deedee June 22nd
While the widgets improvement is great, I think there is still a lot of room to improve.
Some ideas:
( )- Enable to place links, images, lists, and rich html texts (similar to the new post admin) seamlessly (with ajax?), maybe similar to Blogger’s widgets features…
- Same as above, but ability to edit the widgets in the front-end on the fly.
rick June 23rd
Nice post. Once I upgraded to 2.8, I lost the ability to edit and drop/drag widgets. Solution was to deactivate all widgets..make changes…and only added back widgets I really needed.
( )Ash June 24th
I love 2.8, apart from the plugin manager. 2.7 made more sense. 2.8 very confusing.
( )Diana Blue June 24th
Thanks so much for putting this list together. It is perfect. WordPress 2.8 is definetely faster than 2.7. Faster when you edit and add new posts, and faster when you browse the blog.
( )AaronBentley June 24th
Really good article, will re-tweet in a mo. I am currently chopping up my first WP theme, took to 2.8 very easily and v. impressed with WordPress, however, i have been using expression engine for the past few months with good results, and now not sure which one to continue with :S
( )Andrew Turner June 25th
Thanks!
As to which to use, WP or EE it soley depends on your website. Keep in mind that WordPress is at the core, a blogging platform whereas ExpressionEngine is a content-management system by nature.
( )yogesh June 25th
great list, just cam in time
( )yogesh June 25th
great list, just came in time to help me
( )Azri Jamil June 27th
awaiter
( )om ipit June 27th
yesss…. wordpress is rock
i will bookmark this
( )Mohamed June 30th
WP is the best Blog script!!
( )DemoGeek.com June 30th
Has anyone faced any serious issues upgrading to WP 2.8? It keeps showing up on at my DemoGeek.com dashboard but was hesitant to take the shot as I’m not sure if things will all work fine or not after the upgrade. Since I’ve been using some plugins which I’ve modded to fit my style I’m a bit worried that I might have to redo the whole thing again (in terms of fixing the plugins again).
Any lessons learned that you’d like to share when it comes to upgrading to WordPress 2.8?
( )Wordpressthemegenerator July 9th
Thanks for showing or publishing for this good Template.
Word-press Theme Making Online at Website now check it.
( )