WordPress 2.9 Released

In addition to the news on WordPress 2.9, a partial translation of the official release:

I am writing on behalf of the entire WordPress development team and the community to report on the availability for download of WordPress version 2.9 “Carmen” , named after jazz vocalist Carmen McRae . You can already easily upgrade from your Control Panel , through Tools> Update or, as always, download from WordPress.org and do everything manually. And of course, we would not release such a phased release without providing it with a detailed video describing all the most useful features.


The most significant updates from the user point of view:

1. Global recycle bin / restore means that if you accidentally delete a record or comment, you can restore it from the recycle bin. It also annulled the annoying many “are you sure?” Messages before each deletion.
2. Built-in image editor allows you to cut, edit, rotate, mirror and customize images directly from WordPress. This is the first of many planned improvements related to working with media content.
3. Group update plug-ins and compatibility check, which allows you to update up to 10 plug-ins at the same time, without bothering to click on each of them separately. We also started using new compatibility data to help you understand whether the plugin is compatible with your version of WordPress.
4. Simplified video upload , which allows you to simply paste the video URL from a video hosting service, the rest of the work is done by WordPress itself, turning it into a correct integration code. Already supported: YouTube, Daily Motion, Blip.tv, Flickr, Hulu, Viddler, Qik, Revision3, Scribd, Google Video, Photobucket, PollDaddy and WordPress.tv (more in the next release).

Version 2.9 includes a lot of improvements that you can appreciate if you barely try it in action. Read more in the release . All of these improvements result in over 500 tickets, bugs and improvements planned for this cycle.
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The work on 2.9 was awesome, which more annoyed our appetites for working on version 3.0, which is expected to happen in spring 2010, and will include at least MU integration with the WordPress core, and a new default theme. We can't wait to start work, but so far there is a bit of Carmen McRae vocals and beer. Join now! :-)

Source: WordPress 2.9 Released