BuddyPress 1.7 “Totonno” has arrived, and it’s our best version yet!

What’s New in 1.7

BuddyPress 1.7 is a major feature release, containing hundreds of bugfixes and dozens of new features. We’ll show off a few of our favorites below. Want to see a full changelog for 1.7? Check it out on the Codex.

Theme Compatibility

BuddyPress’s social features add new kinds of content to your WordPress site: groups, profiles, and so on. Until now, displaying that content has required building or finding a BP-compatible theme – one of the biggest hurdles to using BuddyPress. Version 1.7 makes this a thing of the past. Using a feature we call “theme compatibility”, BuddyPress can display its content within the context of any WordPress theme – no modifications required. Here are a few screenshots showing BP running on a few popular themes:

Twenty Twelve

Twenty Twelve

Coraline

Coraline

Woo Superstore

Woo Superstore

Not satisfied with the way it looks out of the box? Not a problem. BuddyPress still provides a sophisticated, modular templating system, which you can easily customize in your own theme. Theme developers and designers can learn much more about theme compat on the BuddyPress codex.

Group Administration

Group Administration in BuddyPress 1.7

Group Administration in BP 1.7

If you’ve run a BuddyPress-powered community site, you know that groups are a powerful way for members to connect. But there’s been no way for site administrators to manage groups. BP 1.7 introduces a brand new set of Group Administration panels on your WordPress Dashboard. Now BP admins can bulk-delete groups, edit group settings, and manage group membership without ever leaving wp-admin.

A Better Installation Experience

About Screen

About Screen

BuddyPress makes it easy to add social features to your site, and BP 1.7 streamlines the process more than ever. We’ve removed the installation wizard in favor of a totally automated setup – just hit Activate, and we’ll handle the rest. On new installations, only the Activity and Extended Profiles components are activated, helping you to start small and grow your community features bit by bit. And, following in WordPress’s footsteps, we’ve added About and Credits screens, helping you to get up to date on the BuddyPress project.

Springtime Goodies

BuddyPress 1.7 is codenamed “Totonno”, after the legendary Brooklyn pizza joint. Totonno’s is just a few blocks from the Cyclone and the Coney Island boardwalk, and there’s no better end to a lovely spring day than to indulge in what may be the world’s greatest pepperoni pie. With spring finally coming to Brooklyn, we think it’s appropriate to honor a pizza institution with what we think will be a watershed BuddyPress release.

The BuddyPress Community Rocks

Hundreds of developers, designers, and community volunteers have put thousands of hours into this version of BuddyPress. When you use BP, you’re standing on their shoulders. The following individuals contributed patches during the 1.7 release cycle:

aesqe, apeatling, borkweb, calin, chouf1, chrisclayton, cnorris23, ddean, DennisSmolek, Dianakc, dontdream, empireoflight, enej, ethitter, fanquake, gmax21, hnla, humanshell, imath, Jacek, jag1989, jbobich, jkudish, jpsb, karmatosed, MacPresss, magnus78, markjaquith, Maty, mercime, michael.ecklund, modemlooper, nacin, netweb, rogercoathup, sboisvert, sbrajesh, slaFFik, steve7777, tiraeth, will_c, wpdennis, xt4v.

Enjoy!

Do you have questions about the latest BuddyPress release? Check out the BuddyPress Codex – our growing collection of official documentation – and especially the pages in the 1.7 category. Volunteers are also standing by in our active support and discussion forums. If you’ve found a bug in BuddyPress, or if you want to contribute code to the next release, our development home is buddypress.trac.wordpress.org

You might not be able to make it to Coney Island this summer, but we think that BuddyPress 1.7 “Totonno” is (almost) just as good. Download it today from the wordpress.org plugin repository, or from your WordPress Dashboard.