When WordPress 2.5 came out a few months ago, there was a lot to like but there was also a lot to not-so-like. The layout of key parts of the program, including the dashboard and the editing page for new posts, didn’t seem very well thought out. The overall design was visually noisy and distracting, as well.
This week we got the next big thing from WordPress and the programmers clearly felt our pain. WordPress 2.7 fixes almost everything that went wrong in 2.5 and adds a bunch of new goodies to boot. Sure, there’s a few glitches but it’s definitely the best WordPress yet.
Start with the new dashboard screen (pictured above). As has been much praised, the redesigned dashboard has toned down useless visual noise and amped up things you need to see, with smarter color and layout decisions. I appreciate the new greyish tone that recedes out of mind so you can find what you’re looking for quickly. And the functions along the left side roll-up or down as needed. For example, in the picture above, I clicked on “Tools” and WordPress rolled out choices like “Import,” “Export” and “Upgrade.” Click on “Tools” again to roll them up. There’s even a handy quick post section for writing a quickie without leaving the dashboard.
The main page for writing and editing posts has likewise gotten less busy and more useful. Thankfully, lists of tags and categories have moved back to the right side, next to where you compose your posts. I was always forgetting to use them after they got buried below the post writing area in 2.5. One glitch here, at least using Firefox and a Mac, is that I have to keep my browser window open pretty wide. Otherwise, the box where you actually do your writing doesn’t narrow itself correctly and cuts off the display, as in “hey, where’s my cursor?”
Another even more serious problem remains from the past few upgrades. It used to be when you uploaded a photo that one of the fields you could fill in immediately was the alternate text. That’s where you are supposed to put a textual description of the photo that can be read by browsers for the blind and that appears even if the photo itself doesn’t load. But WordPress changed the upload box so you can only fill in alt text if you write a caption.
I don’t want a caption to appear under my photos. The only way to get just alt text and no caption is to upload the photo, place it in the post, click on it in the post editor and then click on advanced settings to reach the old alt text box. Since every photo needs alt text but not every photo needs a caption, this is backwards. Please fix, WordPress!
Back to the positives, another huge improvement is the new page listing all your existing posts. There’s a menu that appears under each listing now if you mouse over the post’s name. You can choose to quickly jump to edit, preview, delete (with confirmation) or quick edit. The new “quick edit” choice allow you to change or add to the most important fields and metadata without having to open the whole post back on the editing page. It’s great for adding tags or categories you forgot the first time around. One tip – you can use the search box to find all posts about a certain subject and then easily make sure you tagged and bagged them consistently. Quick editing is also available on the list of your existing pages.
Another handy new feature is the display options menu, available on many pages under a light grey button near the top, right side called “Screen Options.” Under this menu you can chose to display or eliminate different headings in lists or boxes on pages. I never use custom tags on my posts, so I can switch off the box for custom tags and not have to see it on my new posts pages. I’m the only author on this blog, so in the list of all existing posts, I can get rid of the useless column displaying authorship.
You can also drag and drop all the boxes on each page to re-arrange the layout. Want the tags list back underneath the editing box instead of on the side? I’ll call you crazy but just drag and drop it where you want it.
WordPress can also run some of its functions from your own computer instead of making your web server do extra work. This feature relies on Google’s Gears program, which you have to install first. Then click the “turbo” button in the upper, right corner of your dashboard to get WordPress geared up.
And that’s all I can rave about for now. I’ll update this review as I discover other cool stuff or find useful write-ups elsewhere.
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