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WordPress Review - It's all grown up and going to college

mike-johnston Profile

We've been using WordPress on and off here at CMS Critic for the last few years. On a couple of occassions, we've gone to great lengths to switch to other platforms to counter the various frustrations we've experience with WP.

Some of those frustrations included:

  • Having to update plugins individually. (pain when you have a large number of them).
  • Issues with WP Dashboard not responding as well as it should with browsers other than internet explorer.
  • Speed issues (yes, with a number of plugins, it started to feel sluggish)

Let me say that when I first clicked on the auto – upgrade to version 3.. I was worried that everything would break and / or I would end up with something I hated.  I'm pleased to say I am wrong.

Before I explain why, let me tell you a little side story for a moment. There is a CMS called MovableType that once contended with WordPress (I say one, because it's no longer in the same league let alone ballpark). It's 4.x series was a decent platform and was nice to work with but MT lacked community size and ease of use. Then, for some unknown reason, someone decided to try to mimick the WordPress dashboard look and feel and with that, in my opinion, they shot themselves in the foot. They now have what I believe is one of the worst admin interfaces I've seen. (some of you may still use and find MT suits your needs but imho it's a dead platform without a positive future)

The WordPress team have done the opposite. Instead of trying to redesign an already very usable dashboard into something over the top, they simply did their best to make things easier and quicker. It wasn't about adding more “stuff” but more about making the stuff that was there more usable.

Here are some of the things I've noticed so far:

  • The Ajax back-end seems to not be so jumpy and skittish when moving windows around in the dashboard and it likes all of the browsers I've used so far.
  • Multiple Plugin Updates! <- This alone is my single most appreciated feature and god bless them for adding it.
  • Drop down menu – Nice quick access to posts and the like with a simple dropdown to speed up the process.
  • The new default theme (Twenty Ten) is very nice and usable.

These are just a few of the improvements. For a full list, check out our WordPress 3.0 announcement of the release (there's even a video there for those of you who hate reading :P)

My Final Thoughts

Loving every minute of it! Thanks Matt and team.. you've done something wonderful with WordPress and we're truly appreciative.

For those who can't wait.. Here's the video: