I have a new plugin coming (beta right now) that will require 3.3 also, but that is due to some of the features. That is a good point for requiring update to new WordPress, an evidence that new WP will bring something new, something user will need. We developers easily forget that 99% of all WordPress users are not developers, and that going with new versions of WordPress is not as natural or easy for them. There were many good points raised about the price of such upgrade and other factors, so this is not simple issue between upgrading or not using a plugin anymore.

I’m with Otto on this one.

My next plugin release actually requires 3.3 as well. I’m hoping just the fact that the user will gain the wp_editor on the front end with my plugin will be incentive enough, but if not, I’ll add code into the plugin which forces use of 3.3 just to be safe.

I’m with Andrea on this one. Backward compatibility is pointless and a waste of your time.

If your users really want to use your plugin/theme, then find out that they must upgrade, they will. This is a major incentive to force users to upgrade, and it eases your development burden in both maintenance and support.

Users should upgrade. We all know this. And they will if given the right incentives to do so. Having plugins and themes that they want to use but need to upgrade for is a great incentive. Heck, I released a plugin today that is already 3.3 only. The next versions of all my major plugins will require 3.3, period. I don’t do backward compatibility anymore.

But the potential for breaking themes and plugins is definitely there and does present a problem; it would be an interesting move to see the introduction of a Long Term Support version that would be updated only in relation to certain bug fixes and security patches.

Thanks for joining the discussion.

Well, that is easy to say :), but much harder to do. I can see free plugins doing that, but with commercial plugins it is not that simple. At least WP 3.0 should be supported nowadays, judging from usage statistics. But, with 50% of all websites using it, it is not easy to simply drop support for it. On the other hand, commercial developers have better way of tracking WP usage, so some compromise can be found. Still, we have too much different WP versions in use, adding 2 more each year. That is the problem.

Stop putting backwards compatibility in plugins and themes. 😉 If people are forced to upgrade to use new features in themes and plugins, they WILL take that jump.

Thanks for the comment Shawn. 3.0 was a big deal update and was advertised as such. And next two failed because they lacked the impact. But, if these 2 were 1 version, adoption rate would be much higher. If things continue like this we will have a great fragmentation of versions by the end of 2012 with five 3.x versions and still many pre 3.0 versions.

I think the reason that 3x had so many downloads is because of the introduction of post-types, menus, etc and the huge press that hit the internet about this new feature set. Basically unless you live in a cave there was no way of missing the news about the huge updates in 3x.

Upgrades after 3x have been great but really did not garner the news that the 3x did. Hence there was no ‘exciting’ reason for people to update.

Having only one major release a year would make it even worse. People simply would not be thinking about updating because they are not used to it. Where if there were major updates every month or so, then you end up in the habit of updating your site.

*I may be rather unusual in that I update all my sites to the nightly build as I keep up with changes on a daily basis

Good thing about WordPress is that there is a huge community and a lot of people had similar problems especially during transitions between versions, and you can always find some useful advises on how to handle most of the problems. This does help to speed up the transition, even if you do it manually. And doing test transitions on local servers or some sandbox server is always a good idea to try and minimize the downtime of the live website.

And, in the early days of my WP experience – since summer of 2006 – I’ve made a lot of mistakes. But I’ve heard here and there that a lot of WP webmasters had these experiences back then… So it’s just learning by doing (and crashing) and to evolve more and more. In these days, work without test installs, playgrounds and local stuff is the absolut regular day-to-day work basis. I just recommend such setups to everyone also the “smallest blogger”.

-Dave 🙂

Thanks for the comment David. Old WP versions usually break on update due to old theme or the plugins. Thankfully, data is compatible and that should be fine.

I will spread this article to some people so they might better understand all these issues. Once again, thanx for bringing it on the table!

-Dave from Germany 🙂

Thanks for the comment. If your core update fails, maybe the problem is with access rights for wp-admin and wp-includes folders. Maybe WP can’t access them to override and delete old files. And yes, it would be great to have less major version updates, one each year would be better than 2, less pressure.

Thanks for the comment. All WP versions report only that update is available, and there is no info on the actual update importance. As you say, many users simply overlook that new version is released.

My GD Press Tools Pro in next 4.3 version will have email notification on updates available. I doubt that WordPress anytime soon will have such option.

Thanks for the comment. It is hard to convince the website owners that upgrade is needed for whatever reason, security mostly. But, if the upgrade is delayed, it is not only WordPress, but upgrade is needed for plugins also, and that all can cause problems and take much more time, and much more money.

So if you don’t login to your dashboard and you see no impact, there’s no reason to update.

Ed,

To solve this exact problem we are offering our clients to host their sites for a nominal fee comparable to hosting companies, just slightly higher but in exchange – we take care of all the maintenance and provide support as needed for basic things.

Small business owners love that option

Considering that we will get 2 WP versions each year, this problem will be much bigger in a year when 3.5 should be out, fragmentation of websites running WordPress will be alarming.

Yep, and those are the most vulnerable. Unfortunately what many of us, more technical people consider to be a trivial task – upgrade, is seen as HUGE project by blog owners.

I have seen this to be especially true with small business owners. Someone built them a site using WP and left them there.

I love the fact that WordPress and good plugin developers are constantly updating and making their products better, but in this case, it is a lot of work and cost involved for the designer to be checking the site weekly and applying in updates.

I have a client still on WP 2.9 and using WPEC 3.7 as their site would require a lot of work to update to WPEC 3.8 since it is so different than WPEC 3.7 and how the theme interacts with the plugin. From the clients point of view what incentive does he has to pay the $500+ to update everything when his site is working fine. From my point of view why should I spent 10+ hours updating everything for free.

To me, this is one biggest of the reason I miss the standard HTML based sites. Once it is completed, very little maintenance is needed.

Thanks for the comment Alex. And this is especially true for very old websites running 2.3/2.5/2.6 because they are so different from latest 3.x versions.

Slow adoption is also in part due to FEAR. People who have developed their site using WP are simply afraid to take the step to upgrade because it might break their site. They are willing to deal with possible security threat and those willing to pay someone with technical knowledge do, but many just stay on old version.

Education is a huge factor to make technical things simple for people.

Thanks for you comment. Yes, once you upgrade there is no going back, and than problems can start with plugins or themes. Rollback would be a problem if upgrade contains database upgrade (major versions of WP usually change database). So, right now only solution is to back up everything prior to upgrading WordPress.

Thanks for this really interesting stats showing the decreasing interest in getting new versions of WordPress since 3.0 is released. No wonder we see 3.0 as dominating, and 3.1 and 3.2 far behind. As I said, 13.000.000 downloads for 3.2 is not that impressive considering number of WordPress websites and current usage statistics.

Thanks for the comment Jonathan. Good point about the dead or abandoned sites.It is hard to determine how many such websites are still online, but there must be a fair percentage of them.

wpMail is a good source, but it is a weekly choice of articles. Community needs all-round news website that is current, objective and capable of reaching wider user base. I know that it is not easy to create such website, but it would be good to see someone try that.

I wonder how many WP sites that haven’t upgraded are really simply “abandoned” projects. I have one or two that I set up on a brainstorm 2-3 years ago that never went anywhere. Currently, they are just “hanging out” there. I’m guessing there are many people with sites like that, even while some of there other sites are very current – even getting beta upgrades. So same cutting-edge user may have some apparently “slow adoption” sites, but really they’re just abandoned and ignored.

I’m guessing the automatic admin interface upgrade notifications should help active sites stay much more current than before. This is very helpful to me.

Finally, I’m growing in my reception of RSS and email feeds from credible WP sources, and hopefully there will be a groundswell of this sort of thing. For example, just last week I discovered the free wpMail.me. I signed up, and when I got me first issue (#26) I was delighted to see the following news item among others: “Two years of Dev4Press”.