Today I’m releasing version 1.2 of BuddyPress Docs, the popular collaborative writing plugin for BuddyPress. Version 1.2 is a near-complete rewrite of BuddyPress Docs, with a number of notable new features.

The biggest change is that Docs functionality is no longer limited to Groups. Previously, Docs could be created only within the context of groups, with the interface for browsing, reading, and creating Docs located within the group interface. In BuddyPress Docs 1.2, Doc creation and viewing is moved into top-level templates, which gives you more breathing room when viewing and editing. This makes your URLs more attractive, too (though old, group-based URLs continue to work, through redirection). Most of all, this change makes it possible to create Docs that are not linked to a group at all.

Hand in hand with group-independence is the new Docs tab in user profiles. Here you can see the Docs that a user has created, and those that he has edited. This is a great way to get a sense of what a member is up to around the site, and also is very handy for users to keep track of changes that they themselves have made. You’ll also have access to a fully functional directory of sitewide Docs – just add a link to /docs/ to your nav menu.

There are some nifty changes under the hood, as well. The data schema for associating Docs with groups has been overhauled and simplified. And a new function, bp_docs_has_docs(), lets you initiate a new Docs loop wherever you’d like, querying according to a number of handy parameters.

If you’re upgrading from a previous version of BuddyPress Docs, you’ll see an admin notice, right after upgrading, asking you to run a short migration process. Make sure you do so right away.

This rewrite has been a long time coming, and far more complex than I’d first imagined it would be. Still, it’s likely that there are some bugs. If you find problems, please post an issue at Github.