WordPress 2.6 was released on July 15 2008

WordPress 2.6 is out

If you are using WordPress, and you probably should be if you are not, you'll want to know that WordPress 2.6 has been released.

Widget Bug Fix

First of all, it fixed the Javascript bug that came with 2.5 that made moving widgets a pain.

Plugin Management Improvements

It also separates active and inactive plugins on the plugin page so it is easier to manage them instead of one big list like before.

If you upgrade your install or WordPress, you can finally enable and disable more than one plugin at the time.  That takes a lot of the work out of updating!

If you decide to replace a plugin with a new one, you still need to upload the new one via FTP,  If you forget to delete the plugin being replaced, you can now select it from the deactivated plugins and select delete.  That will also save some time.

Remove and Auto Blogging Setting Change

If you use any remote or autoblogging software, you'll now have to enable it on the Write page since it will be disabled on any new installations.

Theme Selection Pain

The theme selection page is now more work than ever! You now have to go through a theme preview page which appears in an iframe, so it is two clicks instead of one.  I like having previews. I don't like being forced to see a preview!   They could have added a button or link for switching to one, but they didn't.

If you keep people from framing your site via Javascript as a security measure, you'll now have to remove that code before you'll be able to switch to your theme otherwise you'll see a preview page with no switch to theme link. What a bummer!

Post Revisions

Wordpress 2.6 includes the ability to go back and see previous versions of a post. It will inflate your database a bit, but it will help with those oops I didn't-mean-to-make-those-changes moments.

Image Captions

With WordPress you can add captions to your images, so now you can actually tell people what is in an image and have it appear together.

Google Gears

Google Gears is a caching system for administration files, it is supposed to speed up the process. You have to click on Turbo to enable it. You also have to install Gears in your web browsers.

There are more changes, but they are pretty minor.

Should you upgrade now?  It is normally best to wait a couple weeks before upgrading Wordpress because there is the risk that a plugin you use will be broken.