Although I am grateful for their latest update for the iPhone, it became apparent that not all WordPress Apps were created equal, with some mobile platforms receiving extra attention in the “feature department” than one notable other.

Whether this has to do with the nature of the app stores themselves (i.e. Apple’s aristocracy vs Google libertarianism) is unknown, although here is a brief chart comparing the apps against each other, which may make a few geeks “iJealous.”

WordPress for Blackberry

Of all the WordPress apps on any mobile device, WordPress for Blackberry has the most features–not to mention the fact that it’s the only one that currently embraces VideoPress.

The fact that the Blackberry app also supports custom fields puts it ahead of its brethren, with the additional “more tag” (aka post expandable summary) rubbing salt into my iWound.

WordPress for Android

WordPress for Android is the only WP app thus far to support basic WYSIWYG (bold, italics, links–even block quoting!) and there are even future plans of adding WordPress stats as well as VideoPress support later on.

As far as I can tell there are currently no plans to add custom fields as well as the “more tag” within the upcoming app, although I would not be surprised to see these released down the road.

WordPress for iPhone

The only advantage WordPress for iPhone has over its younger brothers is the user interface (which looks like it was actually designed by a caring artist instead of an engineer).

Despite my suspicions that VideoPress will eventually migrate over to the app, I have given up hope that a decent WYSIWYG editor will ever appear within the app (as the link assistance feature can only go so far).

Conclusion

Currently the Blackberry app demolishes its rivals, although I suspect that over the next few weeks we will see the Android pull ahead as the stronger app of the three brethren.

As far as the iPhone WP app goes, I hate to say it but it looks like Apple (for the first time) has the weakest blogging app compared to its rivals–which might signal a shift away from Steve Job’s playground towards more open mobile fields.

While lovers of the iDevice can get around this by using BlogPress and CellSpin, the videos are hosted upon YouTube or CellSpin’s servers respectively, which may not appeal to many bloggers.

This all may change thanks to the release of Google’s Nexus One, not to mention WordPress’s upcoming Android app (which has been in the works since last October) in which WordPress may finally embrace mobile video blogging via VideoPress.

Although VideoPress is a premium service that would leave one $60 poorer, it may be a viable option for professional bloggers who do not want their videos reposted all over cyberspace (via YouTube) or inherit high bandwidth bills.

While Automattic has yet to reveal anything regarding their upcoming plans in the world of mobile, with more smartphones boasting video camera’s with higher resolution, we may finally see WordPress embrace video support later on in 2010.

To know more about this plugin you can watch the video below from WordPress.TV which gives a basic introduction of what the application can do.

The app supports both Wordpress.com and self-hosted WordPress and is currently in version 2.0. Best of all, it’s free!

You can grab it on the AppStore by clicking here.

This is the main reason why most people are afraid to upgrade to the latest version of Wordpress. Thank God Wordpress is always on the lookout for better ways of making things easier for its community. Alas, comes the birth of the Plugin Compatibility Beta.

Compatibility Check

If you would drop by the Wordpress Plugin Directory you would notice that there is a new section titled “Compatibility” found on the right sidebar of every plugin homepage . This is a new feature that aims to help inform people on whether a version of a plugin is compatible on a particular version of Wordpress based on the votes casted by those who have already tested it.

So if you’re not sure whether you should upgrade, just check out the Plugin compatibility consensus of the plugins your using. Though it doesn’t tell us exactly what made the plugin incompatible, at least it gives us a good overview on whether we should continue the upgrade or not.

Powered by the Wordpress Community

Of course, this feature would not work without the input of the community as it is mainly powered by votes. If you do happen to experience any problems with your plugins, then please take the time to inform everyone else! All you have to do is to go to the Plugin’s page and log in to vote.

The voting process is simple. Just specify the version of Wordpress and the plugin and click on whether it is “broken” or if it “works”. After that, Wordpress would automatically log your vote and it will be added to the “consensus” along with the votes of other users.

Wordpress warns users, however, that this feature should not be used to report any minor issues with the plugin. You should only vote “Broken” if the plugin is indeed broken to the point that it is unusable or causes problems with your blog. Otherwise, it might give an inaccurate consensus.

More power to Wordpress and its community!

What do you think about this new feature? Do you have any other suggestions that could make it better?

Jeff Chandler has gone ahead and done up a screencast showing the basic tools available so far in the release. He does note that this might not be the final way the tools are set up, but it does give you some idea of what is being worked on for the next release with regards to image editing.

I fired up my local server today and installed the latest version of WordPress 2.9 and was surprised to see the basic image editing tools already available in the media library. I decided that the best way to display them in action was through video which also gave me another reason to open up CamtasiaStudio. In the video, I show off each individual tool as well as provide feedback on the crop tool as at this stage, does not appear to be user friendly. But, it’s very early in the development stage so it will most likely be better once it hits the public’s hands. Check out the video.

If you want to check out that screencast, head on over to WPTavern.com.

Today I’m bringing you a bunch of WordPress resources. As I’m sure your aware, WordPress is my tool of choice. The wonderful thing about WordPress, is you can do just about anything with it. So I’ve compiled this list in hopes of showing you some cool things you can do with your WordPress site that you might not have known. This list includes general resources, inspiration, quality themes, along with a bunch of tips & tricks (from beginner to more advanced) Enjoy!

If you are just getting into WordPress, or you are thinking about it, this list has a great number of resources that I check out nearly daily, making it perfect for any level of WordPress user or fan.

While many of you that read this blog will probably know nearly all of these sites, hopefully there will be a few that catch your eye that you haven’t frequented because the best way to learn something new about WordPress is to find those hidden gem blogs.

Most of them are in PDF form, so you’ve been warned. If your computer chokes on PDF’s, you might want to look elsewhere, but these files are worth having. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve looked up the same piece of code in the Codex, only to run and do a Google search regarding the function.

If you need a WordPress quick reference sheet, check out those listed on 1st Webdesigner’s list.

If you’re doing much in the way of freelance blogging, or just want some ideas of how you might better organize your own projects using WordPress as a management tool, I highly suggest checking them out.

They each focus on a very specific set of needs and how WordPress might fill those needs (and at times suggests better options), so it’s pretty easy to mix and match a solution that could work for just about anyone.

Here’s a tidbit from the “project management” article to get things rolling…

After checking out all these options Iʼve found the “WordPress-as-Project-Management-System” experience to be extremely lacking. The options are either simple enough that they could be replaced with Google Docs or a simple notebook or so complex that trying to use them is nearly impossible. There simply is no killer project management plugin for WordPress… yet.

I think it is worth noting that the best replacement Iʼve found for Basecamp is an open source project called Project Pier which does almost everything Basecamp does. Itʼs even themeable and they have some pretty slick options. If you want a self-hosted project management solution, Project Pier is definitely the way to go.

Check out WPCandy.com for the original articles, and a pile of other fun stuff.

Here’s a little preview…

With the recent news coming out of WordCamp San Fransisco, and even the buzz from WordCamp RDU, interest is high in WordPressMU, the multi-blog version of single Wordpress. We don’t know when, exactly, the merge of the two will be rolled into one package and released, but more code is being blended almost every day.

In case you haven’t checked out WordPressMU, not only is it the software that powers wordpress.com, and has a much talked about plugin suite called BuddyPress, it is flexible enough to power multiple blogs on separate domains.

She goes on to explain some of the benefits of using WordPress MU (and soon, just WordPress in general), which is actually a longer list of interesting features you might expect. Well worth checking out if you run multiple WordPress sites.

It seems like there are also big UI changes in the works for a future update, and they sound pretty nice.