Video: WordPress MU Is Dead. Long Live WordPress 3.0!

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It looks as if Automattic (the company behind WordPress for you non-geeks) is preparing to unleash WordPress 3.0 to the masses very soon (this week perhaps?), which will provide not only multi-user support, but also allow “super admins” (see the video below for details) to update plugins across multiple sites.

While the average user may not care about the new changes (especially if they have a personal blog which they maintain and write upon themselves), WordPress 3.0 will make it easier for the average blogger to launch their own blog networks via a single log on account. [Read more…]

WordPress MU, GPL and Paywalls

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It started with a 16-word comment, a reply to a commenter on Weblogs Tools Collection that had lamented not being able to afford a WordPress MU plugin that was being offered as a premium service by WPMU.org for $79. The comment simply said the following:

It would be nice if someone entered in the contest plugins that do everything theirs do.

However, the comment came from WordPress founder Matt Mullenweg and that caused a hailstorm of controversy, including a blog post from James Farmer the founder of Incsub, a WordPress MU community, Edublogs, a blog hosting platform based upon WordPress MU and WPMU.org, a WordPress MU community site with free and premium elements.

Farmer accused Mullenweg of wishing that the company would “bust” and the heated exchange continued in the blog comments.

The case shows exactly how heated and volatile the mixture of open source and business cane be sometimes. When community-driven projects meet with business interests the relationship is rarely smooth and perfect, even though the two need each other to survive. [Read more…]

Another WordPress Security Release

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WordPress 2.8.4 is out, and it is yet another security release. Matt Mullenweg describes the issue like this:

Yesterday a vulnerability was discovered: a specially crafted URL could be requested that would allow an attacker to bypass a security check to verify a user requested a password reset. As a result, the first account without a key in the database (usually the admin account) would have its password reset and a new password would be emailed to the account owner. This doesn’t allow remote access, but it is very annoying.

As always you can upgrade automatically from within your admin interface, or download from wordpress.org.

Update: The WordPress MU 2.8.4 version is out too. Download or upgrade automatically.

The James Farmer Interview: Part 2 of 2

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This is the second part of my interview with James Farmer, of Incsub and Edublogs.org fame. Read the first part here before getting down and dirty with this one, please.

Blogs.mu lets anyone host their own WordPress MU powered site. What’s the idea behind the service? Who should use it?

That people should be able to run a WPMU based blog network without having to find their way around a server.

Anyone who wants a WPMU site but can’t bring themselves to brave the install process!

Although we do offer some very simple and easy guides opn how to use and install WordPress MU at wpmu.org – heck, if I could do it back in the day I reckon most people could do it now.

[Read more…]

The James Farmer Interview: Part 1 of 2

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James Farmer is one of the big names in the WordPress MU sphere. He’s one of the guys behind the WordPress MU focused agency Incsub, and also the founder of the poster site of poster sites for the blog hosting platform: Edublogs.org. Sure, I guess wordpress.com is both bigger and probably better technically than Edublogs.org, but this is the mother of all WordPress MU installs, the one that proved that this software can be used for real. If anyone doubted that, that is.

So what are his thoughts on the platform, all the new projects that Incsub has rolled out, and so on? I certainly got them in this mammoth interview, split into two parts. This is Part 1.

First of all, why don’t you tell us a little bit about yourself and your company, Incsub?

Incsub is about my 4th professional incarnation, before that I was an editor at theage.com.au, lecturer at deakin.edu.au and teacher at stacks of different places.

Essentially, while I was in the lecturer mode, I started Edublogs.org to fill a need that I had – providing blogs for people – and it grew (really quick) so people started asking me about making similar sites for them.

Luckily I had also got to know Andrew Billits via the WPMU community by that time, he’s a damn great WPMU coder, and hence Incsub was born.

[Read more…]

WordPress MU 2.8.1 Available Now

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The multi user version of WordPress, called WordPress MU, is finally available in version 2.8.1. You can download it from the official site, as always. This is the first WordPress MU release in the 2.8 branch, which might be a bit confusing but the version numbering is tied to the single user version of WordPress, so you’ll just have to live with it. For changes, refer to the WordPress MU trac in general, and the timeline in particular.

Help Shape WordPress 2.9

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What media features do you want in WordPress 2.9? That’s the question asked on the wordpress.org blog right now, and if you’re a user you really should cast a vote to help shape 2.9.

You might also be interested that the release of WordPress 2.8.1 is near, with the first release candidate now available. There’s also a beta of WordPress MU 2.8.1 if you like to help testing that.

BuddyPress Updated to 1.0.2

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The community plugin for WordPress MU, BuddyPress, has been updated to 1.0.2. This isn’t a crucial update, but it does fix some bugs, says Andy Peatling, so you should hit that update button from within the admin interface. Personally, I’m happy to learn that BuddyPress 1.1 and onwards will manage language files better, since you need to re-upload those after every update. Very good.

The BuddyPress Roadmap

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A while back there was a poll on the BuddyPress website about what should be tackled next. BuddyPress is a plugin for WordPress MU that turns your install into something of a social network. It is currently out in 1.0.1.

The results are in and among the things we’ll see in BuddyPress 1.1, apparently due August 17, are filtering of the activity stream, group categories and tags, image posting to wire as well as quick posting to blogs through the theme, and some other things. Not counting bug fixes an other things that might arise along the way of course.

Project leader Andy Peatling urges developers to join in on the fun, and possibly the roadmap will help. After all, it goes beyond 1.1, all the way to 1.4 actually.