If a new stable version of WordPress is available, you’ll be prompted to upgrade at the top of the dashboard.
Upgrading not only introduces some new (and usually cool) features to your installation, but it also protects you from hackers as security holes are being fixed. I reccomend you upgrade as soon as a new version is available.
On some shared shoting packages, the automatic upgrade function introduced in WordPress 2.7 might not work, but it’s easy enough to do this manually. All you need is
- an FTP client
- the latest version of WordPress – always available at http://www.wordpress.org
Once you’re looged in to your FTP account, do the following:
- delete the wp-admin directory
- delete the wp-includes directory
- make sure you keep the wp-content and all other directories
- delete all files in your root directory, except for the wp-config.php file
- now upload everything from the new package, apart from the wp-config.php file and the wp-content directory
- last step: go to http://www.yourdomain.com/wp-admin/upgrade.php (your new installation might work without this step, but should your database need upgrading, this will take care of it).
You’re done – enjoy the latest WordPress 😉