As the WordPress community slowly upgrades to the new 3.1 version of WordPress they will immediately notice the WordPress.com style user bar known as the “Admin Bar”. The Admin Bar contains quick links such as Profile (“Edit My Profile”, “Dashboard”, & “Log Out”), My Sites (if the WordPress is set up for Network or Multi-sites), Add New (“Post” & “Page”), Comments (depending on level), Appearance (depending on level; Contains: “Menus”, “Widgets”). Personally when I saw this feature pop up in the nightly builds I was taken back by it. The menu can be style to fit you theme both on the site via “styles.css” or in the admin panel with a plug-in. In my theme’s however it doesn’t work well and since it’s only me writing for this blog at the moment, I don’t need it on.
Turning Off The Admin Bar
Admin Bar is adjusted on a user by user basis, so you would find the option in any of the setting panels. To turn it off you must go to users panel and select “Your Profile”, which is also available in the admin bar itself underneath your user display name (nickname). Once in your profile edit page look just below the Color Schemes & Keyboard Shortcuts. You’ll see two new options for the Admin Bar: “(Display) when viewing site” and “(Display) in dashboard”. To hide the bar from view in the front-end (website) uncheck “when viewing site”. To hide the bar from view in the back-end (Admin) uncheck “in dashboard”.
Here’s what the options look like:
Hope this helps guys. Oh and for the official list of what new: WordPress Codex of Version 3.1 and for a list of features to look out for check out: WP Beginner’s: What’s new in WordPress 3.1 (Features and Screenshots)