The Playground

There's been one beta release after another for MT4 and I've been hard-pressed to test them all. It has been an interesting experience though, and I've managed to make a couple of contributions to the latest version with bugs that I've found and working out how to do things. The interface is totally different from previous versions and I'm eagerly awaiting the final release.

I won't be changing all my blogs over until the plugins catch up with the new version. So far there's very few that are compatible. One new plugin that I've already found indispensable is Bookmarks, a plugin that allows users to maintain a list of bookmarks to any page in the application. The list is easily accessed through a "Bookmarks" menu, which is used for managing and adding items to the list as well.

Another new plugin for MT4 is reCaptcha, though I had one hell of a time trying to implement it. After two days of ripping my hair out I finally got it to work, though not how the developers intended, I'm sure.

Template modules are a great feature of MT4 that take the hassle out of having to edit several templates. This was a problem for versions after 3.1 where it was no longer okay to use header includes, because the headers for all the templates were different. I'm pleased to see this has been addressed in the new release.

As I said before, the incorporation of Live Preview into the program has made entry previews that much better. That's only one of the new features. Movabletype.org has a list of new features and improvements that should change the mind of anyone still unsure about wanting to install the new version.