WordPress 3.0.2 is available and is a mandatory security update for all previous WordPress versions. Haiku has become traditional:

Fixed on day zero
One-click update makes you safe
This used to be hard

This maintenance release fixes a moderate security issue that could allow a malicious Author-level user to gain further access to the site, addresses a handful of bugs, and provides some additional security enhancements. Big thanks to Vladimir Kolesnikov for detailed and responsible disclosure of the security issue!

Download 3.0.2 or update automatically from the Dashboard > Updates menu in your site’s admin area. You should update immediately even if you do not have untrusted users.

There’s a new version of the WordPress application for iPad and iPhone with some great new features:

• Video. Record, upload, attach, and play videos within the app. Yay for being able to catch your friends’ and co-workers’ most embarrassing shenanigans creative moments with iPhone video and publish them immediately for all the world to see on your WordPress site.
• A total rewrite of the way local drafts are handled, to prevent the unintentional loss of your pending posts.
• Autosave/post revisions. Bam! One of the “oh, thank goodness” features of the web app makes it into the iOS version.
• Easier setup. Faster and easier process for adding your sites to the app.
• Media Library. We’re gradually getting closer to the media management you’re used to in the web app.

Some great goodness in there. You’ll soon be able to get everything bar the pedestal sinks in these applications. Now .. who out there is still using the web interface? I know I am

The WordPress community took a big step forward today when Matt announced that Automattic has donated the WordPress trademark to the non-profit WordPress Foundation. Moving forward, the Foundation will be responsible for safeguarding the trademarked name and logo from misuse toward the end of protecting WordPress and preventing confusion among people trying to figure out if a resource is “official” or not.

It’s a move towards transparency. It doesn’t matter if you’re running a simple site, or one selling furnace filters, it’s nice to know that the platform you’re using is getting more and more accountable.

It doesn’t matter whether you have a blog about stories you’ve read or about adjustable beds, you always need to make sure that you’re on the latest version of WordPress if you can. most of the fixes in this drop will be relatively trivial, but there’s usually a security patch or two that you shouldn’t really be without.

Download it here

I know there are a number of videos that can show you the new features down at WordPress.TV, it’s no HDTV, but it’s a great way to learn about your favourite platform. Check it out!

photo credit: raman..exploring myself..

If you’ve been keeping on top of your WordPress updates using the automatic upgrade feature, you may have run into a problem immediately after upgrading. A message that prevents access to any page on your blog, “Briefly unavailable for scheduled maintenance. Check back in a minute”. This can happen particularly if your upload hasn’t completed correctly and returned an error.

Cause of the Maintenance Message

During an automatic upgrade, WordPress places a file in the blog root directory called “.maintenance” to prevent visitors from being confronted with ugly, broken pages during the upgrade process. That’s a great little built-in feature, but if the upgrade gets interrupted or fails for any reason, that file doesn’t get deleted and nobody, including you, can access your blog.

Removing the Maintenance Message

All you have to do is delete the .maintenance file from the blog root directory. Simple as it gets. After you’ve deleted the files you should be able to access the site just fine, but you may have to run the automatic upgrade again.

Simple isn’t it, no need to get sweaty pal,s and have to break out the hand dryers. Funny how sometimes the solution is really simple, isn’t it?

The best bit however is the combined core between WordPress and WordPress MU. This means that you can start with a single site installation and grow it into a multi user site. So you can start with a wedding site, and grow a new blog on wedding clothes, one on wedding napkins and one on wedding flowers.

Downloading WordPress 3.0 here

Well, with WordPress 3.0, WordPress and WordPress MU are being merged together. You’ll have a feature so that any standard blog can be turned into what’s called a Multisite configuration. So it doesn’t matter if your blog is about hosting or about the best acne treatment, you can now convert your site into one that supports multiple blogs with a pretty simple process.

• Amazing and simple tool to reweb your site. Very SEO friendly. Corinne Burkhert
• I now have two WordPress blogs and though they are quite challenging to maintain, I love the availability of plugins and themes – Open Source at its best. Frances Bell
• I manage class discussions out of class and provide additional information here following classes that students find difficult; if I am absent, this is where I can teach “remote class” (hasn’t happened yet) Sarah Davis
• We use the self-hosted version for the company blog and dozens of WordPress.Com ones for learners. Great for encouraging reflections on their learning.Leia Fee

That’s just a few of them, there are loads more where they came from. You can use the page a bit like an mmf drawer where you store your snippets. If you ever need to reach in and pull out an idea why WordPress is awesome, just dig in.

So, check out the version of WordPress you’re on. If you’re not on v2.9.2 at the moment, then you need to upgrade. If you are, it will let you know when there’s a new version out!