WordPress 2.2 has been slightly delayed but for really great reasons which will benefit all. WordPress.com has a lot of exciting new features and news for the free blog hosting service. The official WordPress Theme Viewer will turn over 4 million downloads any moment. Want to contribute to WordPress? Get your vote in on what new features you’d like to see with WordPress Ideas. And more WordPress news.
WordPress News
WordPress 2.2: As was announced last week, the release of WordPress 2.2 has been slightly delayed. While WordPress 2.2 has been slightly delayed, there is still some exciting news. Dougal Campbell reports a new feature that allows one step click to deactivate all your WordPress Plugins, making it easier to upgrade.
WordCamp 2007 – July 21-22: WordCamp 2007 will be July 21-22 in San Fransisco and there is now a Meetup page for the event, with no information. If you are interested in attending, why not sign up. That will help give the planners an idea of attendance.
VOTE NOW! The Best Ideas for WordPress Development: WordPress Ideas is a place where you can post your suggestion for improving WordPress, and rate the suggestions of others. I’m actually rather shocked at how few votes have been cast. I haven’t found a single item that has more than 500 votes. With millions of WordPress users, and thousands who want their say in how WordPress works and grows, I would have thought more people would be voting. Have you voted on your favorite things on the want or do not want list?
The most popular WordPress ideas right now are:
- Plugin Update Notification
- Easy Updating of WordPress
- Tags!
- Thumbnail and image resizing
- Default searching of both posts and pages
Do you have a suggestion to improve WordPress? Or want to vote on one you think is a must-have for WordPress users? Go have your say.
WordPress.com News
Contact Form Anyone? WordPress.com members can now add Contact Forms to their blog pages and posts.
More Slideshows: WordPress.com has added more slideshow capabilities for their members. You can now add slideshows from Slideshare.net and Slide.com. For more information, see the Slideshow FAQ.
Want to share files? An exciting feature for WordPress.com bloggers comes with the new Box.net Filesharing Widget, allowing you to share files like documents, video, audio, and photos with friends and family.
Music Blog Community in WordPress.com: Blanathema mentioned that the WordPress.com blog, Amplify, is making an attempt to create a community of music loving blogs on WordPress.com by starting a meme promoting WordPress.com music blogs. Want to join in the fun?
Women’s Health News on WordPress.com: The popular Women’s Health News has moved from Blogger to Women’s Health News on WordPress.com.
Pitcher for the Boston Red Sox Blogs on WordPress.com: With a VIP hosted site, Curt Schilling now blogs on a WordPress.com blog.
Stumble Through WordPress.com: Our WordPress buddy, Engtech announces the WordPress.com Random Stumbling feature link you can use to allow your readers to “stumble” their way through your WordPress.com blog. For example, take a little rambling stroll through Lorelle on WordPress.
One Million Blogs on WordPress.com: The count is now at 899,398 blogs on WordPRess.com with one million going to turn over any time. Do you have any predictions? Virus in Training has estimated May 10. Any other bids? ;-)
What’s Hot on WordPress.com? The hottest blogs on WordPress.com were:
- Idiotic iPod product of the year.
- (Ijok) This is how low-down filthy it gets
- Exclusive Halo 3 preview
- News tonight for developers
- Mac DVD Ripping How To: Handbrake, MediaFork & Anamorphic Widescreen
- Six More Reasons to Use a Paper To Do List
- Top 12 Resumรฉ Blunders
- Hercules, The Biggest Dog In The World
- The Situation of the NBA Draft
- Barry Switzer claims that BYU bugged their phones
The hottest blog posts on WordPress.com were:
- I CAN HAS CHEEZBURGER?
- Scobleizer
- Neomeme
- Web Worker Daily
- Loser with Socks
- elizabeth wong
- HM
- strange maps
- Pop Songs 07
- Park Avenue Peerage
- American Repertory Theatre
WordPress Plugins and Themes News
WordPress Theme Viewer With 4 Million Downloads: Any minute now, the popular WordPress Theme Viewer will count off 4 million downloads from almost 2,500 WordPress Themes. That’s an amazing milestone. Applause!
Updated Today WordPress Plugin: Want to let your readers know your blog was updated today? The Updated Today WordPress Plugin adds a diagonal banner at the top corner of your blog with an announcement of the blog being updated today.
TechCrunch Adds Random Post WordPress Plugin: The popular blog TechCrunch has added a Random Post WordPress Plugin to help visitors find random posts from the past. This and similar WordPress Plugins were featured in Random WordPress Plugins: Rotating Banners, Header Art, Images, Quotes, and Content on Your Blog.
Daily Blog Tips WordPress Theme: Daily Blog Tips WordPress Theme has been released. It is based upon the “old” Theme for Daily Blog Tips, which is actually very similar to the current design. There are two colors schemes available with more on the way.
New WordPress Theme Generator: Weblog Tools Collections announces there is a new Wordpress Theme Generator which allows free Theme creation. Have you tried it?
Weblog Tools Collection – One Plugin a Day: Weblog Tools Collection will be featuring “A Plugin A Day”, honoring a WordPress Plugin and its author once a day through the month of April. These WordPress Plugins were reviewed this past week:
- APAD: Organize Series
- APAD: Flickrss
- APAD: AntiLeech
- APAD: Feeder
- APAD: IImage Browser
- APAD: Author Adsense
Most Popular WordPress Themes: The WordPress Theme Viewer now features 2,451 Themes and 3,908,713 Themes downloads. The top WordPress Themes are:
- Vistered Little 1.6
- MistyLook 3.1
- WP-Andreas01 1.5
- Water 1.1
- ChaoticSoul 1.0
- Japanese Cherry Blossom 1.0
- Cordobo Green Park 0.9.2 BETA 12
- Mesozoic 2.0
- Mandigo 1.16
- Sky3c 2.0
WordPress Plugin Directory: The new WordPress Plugin Directory is going strong and improving as it develops. According to their list, the most popular WordPress Plugins downloaded are:
- Sidebar Widgets
- Akismet
- Subscribe to Comments
- Google Sitemap Generator for WordPress
- podPress
- WPG2 – WordPress / Gallery2 Integration
More WordPress Plugins can be found on the WordPress Plugins Database.
WordPress Community News
New WordPress Community Podcast: The latest in WordPress news is out with the latest WordPress Community Podcast about WordPress 2.2 delayed, GSoC workers, and Aaron Brazell.
Looking for a WordPress Expert? If you are looking for an expert in WordPress Themes, WordPress development, WordPress Plugins, or other WordPress-related expertise, check out the list of WordPress Consultants on Automattic, the parent company of WordPress, and the WP-Pro mailing list.
WordPress Techniques and Tips
Know of any great WordPress tips and techniques articles? Let me know and it may end up on our weekly list.
- Max Limpag – WordPress theme screencast for design-challenged non-geeks
- Ryan Arrowsmith – Creating a Wordpress Theme: Part I, 2
- Learning Nerd – Screencast Tutorial: Intro to Editing a WordPress Theme
- Do not send your subscribers directly to Feedburner
- 5 Golden Tips For WordPress Performance Optimization and Slashdot-Digg Protection
- Create a Calendar Date in WordPress
- Weblog Tools Collection – WordPress Translations: mo and po files
More WordPress News
WordPress Events
The following are upcoming WordPress group meetings and meetups, and a few special blogging events you may want to attend. If you know of any I’ve missed, please post them or contact me on my WordPress Events Page.
The Melbourne Weblogger Meetup Group at Meetup.com With Darren Rowse and Alister Cameron in the planning stages. Stay tuned for more news soon.
- Houston WordPress Meetup – April 28
- San Francisco WordPress Meetup (different group) – April 28
- Successful and Outstanding Bloggers Conference in Chicago – May 11-12 – Many WordPress bloggers and experts should be there
- New York City WordPress Meetup – May 19
- Philadelphia WordPress Meetup – May 19
- WordCamp 2007 – San Fransisco – July 21-22
- Blog Business Summit – Chicago – September 17-19
For a WordPress Meetup near you and other blogging events, check out the WordPress Meetup Group List.
For more news on WordPress, see:
- WordPress Planet
- WordPress Development Blog
- WordPress.com Blog
- Weblog Tools Collection
- BloggingPro’s WordPress News and Tips
- The WordPress Community Podcast
- Lorelle on WordPress
Extra Tip of the Week
Track Your Blog’s Comments Via Email: WordPress blogs have an option to have the owner or author receive an email when anyone comments on any post on their blog. To turn enable it, go to your WordPress Administration Panels Options > Discussion > Email. Within each emailed comment you receive is a link to the comment on your blog, as well as to the Comments Panel for approving moderated comments and/or marking the comment as spam.
If you change your blog’s email to a Gmail account and sign up for Google Talk, when you are online you will see a popup announcement every time someone comments on your blog. This helps you respond to your comments faster.
Each Wednesday on Blog Herald is WordPress Wednesday, featuring the news around the WordPress Community.
Lorelle VanFossen blogs about blogging and WordPress on Lorelle on WordPress.
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