I‘ve never liked the WordPress menus - specifically because for you to do most functions you have two server calls before reaching the page you want - first you select the main menu - get a page refrresh, and only then can you select the sub-menu item.

An excellent plugin that I have used for at least a year is the Advanced Admin Menus plugin - one of several great WordPress plugins by Andy Staines. Well - with the changes to the menu system, that plugin could not survive without a serious rewrite.

Fortunately, Andy has quickly produced an update for Version 2.5. It doesn’t work quite the same as prior versions - in that the earlier versions simply required that you hover over the main menu item to see / select a sub-menu item. With this version, yout need click on the main menu item to get the droplist of sub-menu items - basically the same way as menus work on Windows / Mac applications. Yes - one additional click now - but you still get immediate access to the sub-menu items of any of the main menu items after that initial click - without requiring any server refreshes.

The other thing that this plugin does is that it ‘cleans up’ the somewhat messy split menu that comes with the standard WordPress 2.5. They’ve put the less-utilised items across to the right, in smaller font, and the main menu items on the left. I’ve already had one forum cry for help - as one of my customers has not yet spotted the lesser menu items on the right, and does not know where to go to configure some plugin options.

Contrast this with the neater, easier to navigate Advanced Menu …

Note two things with this improved menu :

• All the items in one menu bar - so newbies are less likely to ‘lose’ the Settings / Plugins options, and
• The one-click access to the submenu items - for any of the main menu items.

Well - this was a relief getting the updated plugin - as WordPress 2.5 is already becoming easier to use …