WordPress News Roundup January 2007: WordPress 2.1 “Ella” Ships With Autosave and a Tabbed Editor

January 2007 was the month WordPress finally shipped its first major release in more than a year. WordPress 2.1 “Ella” landed on January 22 after a long development cycle, bringing autosave, a reworked editor and hundreds of fixes. It came on the heels of two security releases for the 2.0 branch, which kept administrators busy in the first half of the month.

Behind the scenes, Automattic was racing to keep WordPress.com and WordPress.org online as traffic grew. Looking back, 2.1 marked the start of a faster release rhythm that would define the rest of 2007.

Mergers, Acquisitions, and Investments

No acquisitions or funding rounds were announced in the WordPress world this month. Automattic’s attention was on infrastructure rather than deals.

WordPress Core Updates

Three releases went out in January: two maintenance updates for the 2.0 line and the long-awaited 2.1.

• WordPress 2.0.6 (January 5): An important security release recommended for everyone on the 2.0 branch. It also fixed HTML quicktags in Safari.
• WordPress 2.0.7 (January 15): A follow-up release that addressed a PHP-related security problem and a Feedburner issue introduced in 2.0.6.
• WordPress 2.1 RC1: The first release candidate appeared around January 18, giving testers a few days before launch.
• WordPress 2.1 “Ella” (January 22): Named for Ella Fitzgerald, 2.1 introduced autosave, a tabbed visual/code editor with spellchecking, lossless XML import and export, a search engine privacy setting, the option to use a static front page, draft and private pages, and better right-to-left language support. Developers got pseudo-cron scheduling, the WP_Error class and a JavaScript loader. More than 550 bugs were fixed.
• A faster cadence: The 2.1 announcement committed to several major releases a year, with the next version pencilled in for April 23. The 2.0 branch would keep receiving security fixes until 2010.

Other WordPress News

• A look back at 2006: Ahead of 2.1, the WordPress blog published “Ideas and Kvetch!”, noting 1.54 million downloads in 2006 and inviting feedback on where the project should go.
• Launch-day demand: Matt Mullenweg reported in “2.1 and Forward” that WordPress 2.1 was downloaded 52,216 times in roughly its first 24 hours.
• More servers: Automattic brought 20 new servers online late in the month and then added another data center for WordPress.com, as Mullenweg described in posts on January 26 and January 31.
• Automattic meetup: The company held its twice-yearly gathering in La Paz, Mexico, just before the 2.1 launch.

Security Alerts and Plugin Vulnerabilities

Security work this month centred on the 2.0 branch. Version 2.0.6 was flagged as an important update for every 2.0 user, and 2.0.7 closed a further PHP-related hole ten days later. Anyone still on 2.0.5 or earlier was advised to upgrade, while those ready to move on could jump to 2.1.

Industry Trends and Insights

The 2.1 release showed how far WordPress had come from its blogging roots. Static front pages, private pages and a cleaner import/export system made it easier to build sites that looked nothing like a traditional blog. Meanwhile, Automattic’s scramble for server capacity was a reminder that hosted blogging was growing as fast as the downloadable software.

Theme of the Month: Kubrick

Michael Heilemann’s Kubrick remained the default theme in WordPress 2.1, which meant it was the first design almost every new site saw after upgrading. Its blue header and clean sidebar were instantly recognisable across the web, and countless custom themes began as Kubrick modifications.

Plugin of the Month: Akismet

WordPress 2.1 bundled an updated version of Akismet, Automattic’s anti-spam service. As comment spam kept rising, having a capable filter ship with core was one of the most practical benefits of upgrading.

Founder of the Month: Matt Mullenweg

WordPress’s co-founder spent January shepherding 2.1 to release, sharing download figures in public and helping Automattic expand its server capacity. His promise of more frequent releases set expectations for the year ahead.

Looking Ahead to February 2007

With 2.1 out, the next priority was a maintenance release to fix early bugs, along with continued support for the 2.0 branch. Work on the next major version, then scheduled for April 23, was expected to begin in earnest, guided by user votes on the WordPress ideas forum.