How To Create A Membership Site

Has the Release of WordPress 3.0 Had an Effect on Membership Websites?

Posted on 12. Jul, 2010 by Steve in Tips & Tricks, Wordpress

The release of WordPress 3.0 has been in the making for some time and the official release has finally taken place.  As with all major releases, the instant reaction of many people is to find out how these releases will affect their website specifically, and this is an especially important question for people who are using WordPress to manage their membership website.

Downtime is never good for any website, but membership websites have even more pressure than most to be available to users at all times.  This is because members have already paid for access to the content.  This makes planning out the process of upgrading to WordPress 3.0 incredibly important to webmasters of membership websites.

WordPress 3.0 Shouldn’t Affect Your Membership Website

1. Testing

WordPress 3.0 went through a very long and thorough alpha and beta phase.  This should have given every plugin developer plenty of time to update their plugin so that it is compatible with WordPress 3.0.  This is especially true for commercial plugins.  It is very rare that commercial plugins are not ready to go when WordPress releases a new update.

2. Modified Features

The main features that have been modified for the WordPress 3.0 release should not affect how a membership website will operate.  The biggest changes include: integration with WordPress-MU, a new default theme, different editor styles, modified navigation menus, and bulk upgrading.  Very few membership plugins should be affected by this.  However, there may be some potential problems because of the “custom post” changes, however the remedy should be fairly simple.

Keys to a Safe Upgrade

1. Create a Test Site

It is important for every website to also have a test site as well.  This is where you can test out any changes before actually making them to your live site.  By upgrading to WordPress 3.0 on your test site first, you should be able to find out if any complications may arise.

2. Always Create a Backup

It is important to always back up your files before updating your WordPress membership site to WordPress 3.0.  While this is advice that everyone seems to know, many people either forget to do it or just don’t think they will need to.  As long as you have backup, you can always quickly restore your website in the case the upgrading to WordPress 3.0 causes some problems with your membership website.

There are a number of reasons that upgrading to WordPress 3.0 should not affect your WordPress membership website including the features that were modified and the extended time that it spent in the development and testing phases.  However, that doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t double check this issue for yourself.  This means that you should always create a backup for your website as well as utilize a test site before upgrading on your live site.

Tags: membership site, membership website, wordpress 3.0, wordpress 3.0 membership, Wordpress membership website, your membership website