Continued support for WP 3.1

  • In view of the big change in requirements for WP 3.2 and the possible impact on users, are there any plans to continue to maintain WP 3.1 for at least security fixes?

    The impact for me and others which makes it impossible for us to upgrade to 3.2 in the near future are

    . convincing host providers to upgrade PHP & MySQL – mine waht’s to charge! so the alternative is to move but not until the contract runs out.
    . convincing plugin authors to upgrade their code – or hacking the code ourselves if the author can’t be found/motivated.
    . convincing theme authors to upgrade their code – ditto to above.
    . Educating the editors, authors and contributors of our sites to navigate the new admin panels (they are not very computer literate).
    . Finding time to fully test and implement the upgrade.

    I do really think this should have been a major release number not a dot release.

Viewing 3 replies - 1 through 3 (of 3 total)

  • Alle themes run under PHP5. Plugins that don’t is very rare. I think you are exaggerating the task of upgrading.

    Most providers already have PHP 5 available for the customer, and they don’t need to be convinced to upgrade. Have you checked that PHP 5 is not available to you?

    The removal of support for PHP 4 and MySQL 4 was announced over a year ago.

    3.2 is a major release. 3.0 was not “more major” than 2.9, 3.1 or 3.2. “Dot releases” are those 3.1.4 and 3.2.1. Those contain only bugfixes for the latest major release, and security enhancements.

    The changes in 3.2 aren’t really that big. The menu system hasn’t really changed at all, just a birt more explicit wording on the first sub-item. There are style changes. Easier to work with, and clearer. No need to learn again.

    It’s wise to have a test installation with your theme and most plugins. There you can test the RCs before the release and may be contribute to this excellent piece software. Developers try not to break a lot of plugins and themes, but they need feedback to be able to avoid it.

    There is a branch called 3.1 and some things have been backported. Don’t rely on any new releases from that branch. But I guess it might happen if the need is great. Make a suggestion on the ideas page.

    Thread Starter renowden

    (@renowden)

    OK Knut – I’ll take your word for it on themes and plugins and perhaps user education.

    But on host providers – mine is not at a high enough level (DotEasy older Ensim servers PHP 5.0.? and MySQL 4) and they want to charge me to upgrade. That is not the way to treat a loyal customer so I’m not standing for it but need to see out the term of my contract before moving.

    Moderator Ipstenu (Mika Epstein)

    (@ipstenu)

    ?????? Advisor and Activist

    Alle themes run under PHP5.

    MOST themes ?? I know of a few that don’t (we found ’em in beta testing).

    are there any plans to continue to maintain WP 3.1 for at least security fixes?

    No, 3.1 will not be maintained, even for security fixes.

    I do really think this should have been a major release number not a dot release.

    Ah, MINOR misunderstanding. The 3.x branch counts that second number as a large, but not major, release. The 3.2.x branches would be considered minor.

    As for PHP and SQL, both versions required by WordPress are stable and have been out for YEARS.

Viewing 3 replies - 1 through 3 (of 3 total)
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