Click for larger image

QuickPress
Sitting quietly at the top of the page is a new quick access drop-down menu. The default setting New Post transports the user to the New Post page. Hover the cursor over the menu arrow and a number of options make themselves known instantly. Drafts, New Page, Upload and Comments all link directly to their respective segments. The admin panel is another element that has been given a little bit of a tweak. A couple of new admin colour schemes have been introduced. Gone are Classic and Fresh, replaced by a more simple Blue and Gray. Turbo holds a place but again this has been given a tweak over its predecessor. In addition to the Turbo: Speed up WordPress tool, users will now find Press This. This is a bookmarklet, which is a small app that runs in a browser and lets you copy text, images and videos from a webpage. It directly adds the copied item, text, image and so on into a new post window, ready for publishing. To call Press This into action simply drag the link into your bookmarks bar or right-click it and add it to your Favorites.

Configure options
The Dashboard boasts a host of modules that are fully configurable, allowing users to pull in information from external sources. The WordPress Development Blog is effectively an RSS feed that pulls information directly from the WordPress site. Placing the cursor over the title bar reveals the Configure link, click to reveal the content. Now it’s a matter of entering the URL of a desired RSS feed, adding a title, choosing how many items to display and display options before hitting Submit. The Other WordPress News module adopts exactly the same principle, again it’s a matter of modification. The final configurable module on the new-look Dashboard is Incoming Links. Again, another RSS feed but this time with fewer options.

Recommended plug-ins
The final module we are taking a look at is Plugins, which at first glance appears very much the same as previous. However, on closer inspection the accompanying Download link has now changed to Install. The title link still takes users to the Download page, but Install adds a new dimension. This takes the user directly to a window that presents an Install Now link; hit this and the chosen plug-in is installed directly into the wp-content/plugins directory. It’s now simply a matter of activating the plug-in ready to use. This is a perfect example of the tweaks applied to 2.7; simple, effective, functional and ultimately time-saving.

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5