If you are a WordPress user, you will be aware that WordPress 2.5 has been released. So I got tired of seeing the “Your WordPress is out of date” message every time I log into my dashboard – and thus decided to upgrade. Now, I’ve upgraded 3 versions of WordPress before with no problems so I assumed the same will be for this version.

The easiest way to upgrade your WordPress version is to use the “Automatic WordPress Upgrade” plugin. This plugin automatically backsup your blog, de-activates your plugins, puts your site into maintenance mode, downloads the latest version of WordPress (in this case 2.5), upgrades your database, re-activates your plugins and completes the update.

However, after I completed the upgrade process, I was in a panic as my blog sidebar displayed a “Fatal Error”. Turns out, the very popular “Popularity Contest” plugin is incompatible with WordPress 2.5! Fortunately, it was easy to fix. For those having problems with the Popularity Contest plugin after upgrading, here’s what to do:

1. Deactivate the plugin (it would most likely be deactivated)

2. Get the latest version here: Popularity Contest

3. Open “popularity-contest.php” and replace the following:

Replace require(’../../wp-blog-header.php’); with require(’../wp-blog-header.php’);

4. Upload the edited file to your Plugins directory

5. Activate the plugin

That ought to fix the Fatal Error.

So what do I think of WordPress 2.5, well… the jury is still out. I am a little uncomfortable with it at the moment because of the major interface change. However, I do see a lot of improvement too in the way we manage posts, add media and also other improvements like the ability to track incoming links from other blogs. Here’s what the new admin interface looks like:

For all you WordPress bloggers out there, I hope you had an easier time upgrading!

Tags: popularity contest, Wordpress