WordPress recently released WordPress 2.8 Beta, which has some interesting new features which will come in handy.

As usual I’ve tested it out, and here are the highlights:

New theme installer

This new theme installer now means that WordPress can install themes you find on the WordPress Theme Directory straight to your theme directory without the need of FTP or manual file copying. It’s very similar to the automatic plugin installation system that was implemented in WordPress 2.7. However, it is more advanced and allows the user to select certain filters to make searching easier. This will definitely be a nifty little feature to look forward to.

Widget handling

The widget handling system has been improved, with a much better click and drag interface which is much simpler to use than the previous widget handling system.

Those are the two things I find most useful. Other than that, I can’t find anything else that I would find outstanding.

WordPress has posted a Codex page with information that corresponds to the WordPress 2.8 Beta, so if you’d like a full changelog please click here.

Try it out and see what you think. I haven’t found any major bugs, but I’d recommend you don’t install it on your main blog/site. If you can, create a test blog for WordPress 2.8 beta and wait for the final release before installing it on your main blog/site.