WordPress 2.9
We had some internal training Monday on the exciting new WordPress release. Version 2.9 introduces new features to make your blog more attractive and boost your SEO rankings.
Here are the highlights from the numerous changes that went into this release:
1. “Trash” status: No longer worry about accidentally deleting your posts, pages, and comments. The “delete” links have been changed to “trash”, and new screens let you restore trashed content or delete it permanently. Think of it as your computer’s Recycling Bin, but for your blog.
2. Image editor: A built-in image editor let’s you crop, rotate, and resize your pictures right from inside WordPress.
3. Post thumbnails: WordPress now lets you attach a small picture to your posts. Just upload your image, and WordPress takes care of resizing and cropping it to a standard size, then displaying it with your content. A few changes are needed to enable this feature in your blog theme. Clients should contact their Xeno Media project managers to arrange this modification.
4. Canonical tags: The new version of WordPress generates these new HTML tags automatically, pointing search engines to the “official” URLs of your posts and pages, avoiding “duplicate content” penalties that might harm your search engine rankings.
In addition, the WordPress developers have started building the framework that will let WordPress 3 (expected 2nd quarter 2010) go beyond pages and posts, and support a variety of custom content types.
Version 2.9.1 came out last week to fix a few bugs in the initial release, and we’re confident it’s safe to upgrade your blogs and take advantage of these exciting new features.
