With the imminent release of the new version of Wordpress (version 2.7) I thought it would be fitting to show you just how you can update your blog quickly and easily. There is no need to even download the new software from Wordpress.org and there is certainly no need for uploading any new Wordpress files to your host. There is a handy plugin that can do all this work for you. This plugin is called Wordpress Automatic Upgrade.
Once you have downloaded this plugin to your desktop and uploaded it to your /plugins folder, you need to activate it in your Wordpress dashboard. Once activated, and if your blog indeed needs updating, you will see something that looks like this at the top of your Wordpress dashboard:
Did you notice the little red sign that is next to the “plugins” tab? Well this sign is telling me that I have 5 plugins that need updating, so this is what I need to update first.
Click on your “plugins” tab and you will be able to see exactly which ones need upgrading. Go through each plugin that needs upgrading and click on upgrade automatically on each one.
Once all your plugins are updated you can now upgrade your Wordpress installation. You first need to click on “Click here to automatically upgrade Wordpress to the latest version” that is at the top of your dashboard, and you should come to a page that looks like this (click to enlarge):
All you need to do is simply click your way through the upgrade process until it says “Congratulations!!! Your Wordpress version is up to date”, and you’re done.
This plugin also allows you to download a backup of your Wordpress blog before the actual upgrade takes place, so don’t forget to do this once prompted just in case anything goes wrong with the process.
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