Sofie Estolloso Hofmann Designs International

I have upgraded the sites and blogs that I maintain using WordPress as a blog publishing platform as well as a CMS from WordPress 3.0.5 to WordPress 3.1 “Reinhardt”. But I did not upgrade all the sites because I encountered the same problem that I mentioned when I upgraded to WordPress 3.0 “Thelonius”.

I will just wait for the bug fix release of WordPress 3.1 before I upgrade the three other sites. Just like what I did the last time, I also did not upgrade the three sites but waited for the next release. When I upgraded to WordPress 3.0.1, WordPress fixed the problem by itself.

I also noticed that the new WordPress release has the latest version of Akismet now, which is Akismet version 2.5.3.

Regarding the new features, I immediately noticed the admin bar on top of the page. The admin bar only appears on the page itself when you are logged in. It does not appear when you are inside the dashboard or any part of the dashboard.

It is actually a good feature because logging out became easier when you are on the page. I, myself, when I design a WordPress theme, I normally do not include the login and logout functions on the sidebar or any part of the site or blog.

That is why, I am really wondering why some people would like to deactivate this new feature when the regular readers do not even see that admin bar unless they are registered members and, add to that, logged in.

On the writing interface, most of the panels have been hidden. If you are using custom fields, that panel is hidden too. If you would like to see it always visible under the post box, just click the Screen Options on the top right to get the panel back.

On the Posts side, if you click posts, you will see your list of posts under the Title column. Other columns are the Author, Categories, Tags, Comments and Date. A new column was added, the Views column.

As I see it, the Views column is only available to those who installed the WordPress Stats plugin. If you installed the WordPress Stats plugin but did not activate it, you will not see this new feature.

I especially checked another site without the WordPress Stats plugin and I did not see the Views column.

The new Views column is actually very convenient. I also would like to see how many views my posts have but I am not really fond of checking the statistics that often. Adding the Views column is a very good idea. I really like this new feature.

There are more new features but I have not really explored them that much yet.

Well then, if you are upgrading to WordPress 3.1 now, please do not forget to back up your files and databases.

If you need any information on how to back up your database via phpMyAdmin, just read the blog entry.

Updated on March 15, 2011

I checked the Views column again on the Posts section. I realized that it is only available to those who installed the WP-PostViews plugin (not the WordPress Stats plugin). If you installed the WP-PostViews plugin but did not activate it, you will not see this new feature.