Our favorite blogging/CMS platform has released a beta version for their upcoming big update 3.2 and after a quick overview I can say that apparently is more of a facelift for WordPress.

The biggest change you’ll notice is on viewing the Dashboard for the first time, where the design has received a welcomed overhaul. It’s not a complete redesign but it sure makes you ol’ Dashboard feel fresh.

The left sidebar is now organized with links to every instance of the site managing. This sidebar is now organized in four sections, on for the Dashboard overview, one for the post managing, other for the site settings, including themes, plugins, users and tools, and one for custom settings created by pluginh. A nice arrow lets you know on which part inside a section you’re currently in. The collapse menu button has been moved to the bottom of the sidebar and now it even has describing text next to it.

The site title is now smaller and moved to the second column, which is the main editing and managing part. And since the toolbar on top has been removed secondary tools like Screen Options and Help look now cleaner on the top right corner of the window.

Other changes are purely in style, ranging from the change of the main font to Arial, and a slight change of look for tabs, buttons and forms.

The visual editor has received not only new icons but also a really nice looking and clean full screen option that lets you focus on the content and nothing else. A message on the bottom right of the editor is the best way to describe this new functionality: “Just write.”

A new default theme has also been included with the release simple called Twenty Eleven which showcases some of the new template coding capabilities of WordPress 3.2. I didn’t had the chance to look deeper into it yet, but I’ll let you know soon.

Also WordPress has joined forces with a revamped Browse Happy to let you know if you’re browser is out of date.

On the requirements side of things now you need at least PHP 5.2.4 and MySQL 5.0 to run WordPress and Internet Explorer has been ditched.

I’ll keep exploring more features on this promising new version of WordPress so you’re invited to check back this blog.