WordPress 3.1 release candidate now available

The developers at WordPress.org have announced the availability of the first release candidate for the WordPress 3.1 publishing platform. With "no known issues or bugs to squash", the developers say "we think we're done", but would like to see wider testing of the planned release, noting that "with tens of millions of users, a variety of configurations and thousands of plugins, it's possible we've missed something." The developers recommend that the release candidate is not run on live production sites, "unless you're extra adventurous". Plugin and theme developers are especially encouraged to test the new version's release candidate to ensure compatibility.

The new version 3.1 includes, for example: the ability to set formatting on a per-post basis, an updated Tiny MCE editor, an "Ajaxified" administration system, a new Admin bar to link together admin screens, easier linking to pages within a site, enhanced queries, various cleanups of the code and a new mechanism for resetting a password. More details of the new features in 3.1 are available from the WordPress Codex.

To test the WordPress 3.1 RC1, users can either download the release candidate (direct download) or use the WordPress Beta Tester Plugin and set the plugin to "bleeding edge nightlies". Any bugs or issues found during testing can be reported in the forums, mailing lists, over IRC on irc.freenode.net #wordpress-dev or directly into the WordPress Trac. Known issues are also listed on the WordPress Trac. WordPress is licensed under the GNU General Public License (GPL).

(djwm)