With WordPress 2.8 beta 1 now available – there are some great new features that I wanted to highlight for the upcoming WordPress 2.8 release.

An exhaustive list of all the updates are available for review, but here are ten highlights for the end user.

• Don’t ask for confirmation when marking a comment as spam
• Don’t notify post author of own comments
• Allow the dashboard widgets to be arranged in up to four columns as set via the Screen Options tab
• Improved Plugin search on Administration > Plugins > Add New
• Autosave post/page when pressing Control/Command+S
• Support more than one gallery on the same page
• “Choose a city in the same timezone as you” for Timezone in Administration > Settings > General
• Add “Send this password to the new user by email” option to Administration > Users > Add New
• In upgrade process, provide better explanation for database upgrade message
• Add password strength meter to Add User and Edit User

Everything looks very promising and the developers are doing a great job with getting bug fixes in place, more options, and easier to user interfaces. Stay tuned for the release of WordPress 2.8 in the near future!