Technology and design in plain language.

We waited a while for it, but it's finally here. *much rejoicing*

The beta testing went on for a while, but really it was worth the wait. I'm rarely opposed to waiting for a program to get better; and I wasn't disappointed. The end product is a versatile program that adds both strength and flexibility to it's already powerful core.

And functionality! Some of my personal favorites:

• Plugin Central: Plugins add a great deal of functionality to Movable Type's already powerful core. But installing plugins to previous versions would sometimes go forgotten because once the files were copied over, you'd never have any indication that they were there (like Scripturizer or MTRegex). Now any plugins you add show up on a "Plugins Overview" page.
• Designer Defaults: Anyone who's ever installed a brand, spanking new weblog with Movable Type knows the look I'm talking about. Dull, lifeless blue on the fence between powder and corpse, the header in pasty white Trebuchet. Everyone, as quick as they can after pressing "Create New Weblog", goes straight to the CSS and changes those colors. Well, 3.2 gives you the power to create your own custom defaul pages, so when you click "Create New Weblog" it's using your styles instead of ... *yawn*
• Easy to Install:As I've mentioned before, I am a pragmatic designer, so easy is good. And upgrading to 3.2 is fairly easy. Just drop in the files, and go. Of course, I hit a snag with one of my plugins (had to remove my plugin_data table before it worked), but that's why I said "fairly" easy and not "really" easy.
• Tastes Great: One look at the main screen and you know it's a winner. Sleek new interface with alot more at hand. Icons that look good and make sense all at once. It really is a beautiful interface. AND they've simplified your entry and template listing so that selecting and perusing entries becomes much easier.

There's alot more, but I suspect I'll be ranting about this one for a while. Another great thing I did forget to mention was that you can either pick up a $39 personal copy for yourself (support included) or you can just get the free one-author, unlimited-site license. Go ahead. It's much more entertaining than reading my blog, promise.

Oh and if I've convinced you to make the switch, tell everyone else by getting an official MT 3.2 badge for your site -- or one of my unofficial ones.