WordPress 3.0 Features and Improvements

Here is a sneak peak of WordPress 3.0 which is scheduled to be released on May 1st 2010.

Improvements:

• WordPress Merged with WP-MU – As most of us already know that WordPress MU allows users to run multiple sites under one installation. In the upcoming release, WordPress MU will be merged into the WordPress Core. So, from now on, you will be able to run more than one site/blog from a single installation of WordPress.
• Change your own Username / Password – This is a feature that I have always wanted from WordPress. From version 3.0, whenever you install WordPress, you will be able to choose your own username and password. You will no longer have to accept “admin” for the username and a randomly generated password.
• Custom Post Types -  Until now, you could only add posts or pages to your WordPress blog. This feature will give you power to create content of any type that you want. For example, you can have Portfolio listings, Products, Catalogs, Library etc. This feature is not going to replace categories or Tags. You will still be able to use categories. Custom Post Types will allow a different way of sorting/displaying your content.
• Better Menu Management – This is another feature that was missing in WordPress until now. In the new release, a better menu management has been integrated. This menu system will have a drag and drop functionality that will combine Pages, Categories, and Links. It will also allow the ability of re-ordering, along with sub-menus, and hiding specific Pages or Categories from the menu altogether.
• Custom Background Image Support – In Version 3.0, you will be able to manage your background image for the themes. You will be allowed to upload a background image and change its settings (positioning, repeat, attachment). This will save some work for the Theme designers.
• New Deafult theme – The WordPress 3.0 release will be packed with a brand new default theme called 2010. This theme will include Custom header, Custom Background, Clean Design, Multiple Widget Areas, Cascading Menus and a lot more. Overall, it will be a good base to build on for custom themes. At Crenk we gave you a sneak into this new WordPress default theme a couple of months ago.
• Custom Author Templates – In WordPress 3.0, you can create specific templates for every author of your blog.  For example, you will be able to create a author-michael.php or author-123.php, which will be called via the WordPress Template Hierarchy in connection to the author with their nicknames michael or ID 123. Now it will be easy for an author to mark his/her own post or entry with his/her signature.

There are a lot of other improvements that will only be discovered once WordPress 3.0 has been released in public. Here is the official declaration of the changes :-

http://codex.wordpress.org/Version_3.0#Development.2C_Themes.2C_Plugins