Self-hosted WordPress users, get your update engines running: WordPress 3.3 is now available.
The culmination of five months of hard work, WordPress 3.3 offers a number of new updates and tweaked features.
The first of these is a redesigned dashboard, which features menus and toolbars that are more cohesive and easier to maneuver on smaller screens.
WordPress 3.3 has also added call-outs and pointers for new users, as well as better contextual help. The media manager, a long-standing point of pain for the CMS, has received an upgrade and now supports drag-and-drop file uploading. Let's hope a more robust management and search system appears in future releases.
As WordPress matures, releases become less about breakout features, and more about refining what already works and improving the backend for developers.
On the developer side, there is a new editor API for better integration with the core WordPress post and page editor, as well as updated versions of jQuery and jQuery UI.
I've already updated most of my personal sites to WordPress 3.3 and enjoy the new admin toolbar and the layout of the side navigation menus. Let us know your thoughts of WordPress 3.3 in the comments.
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