Step # 1: Deactivate all plugins

Just in case

Step # 2: Backup existing database and wordpress directory

Type the following commands at shell prompt:

mkdir /backup/wp/080624
mysqldump -u user -p WP-DATABASENAME > /backup/wp/080624/blog.db.sql
tar -zcvf /backup/wp/080624.tar.gz /var/www/blog

Step # 2: Download latest wordpress CMS

cd  /tmp
wget http://wordpress.org/latest.zip
unzip latest.zip

Step # 4: Overwrite all new files

cd /var/www/blog
cp -avr /tmp/wordpress/* .
rm -rf /tmp/wordpress /tmp/latest.zip

Step # 5: Open you admin panel

Open a browser and go to http://yourblog.com/wp-admin/ and reactivate your plugins.

And you are done. Thanks to UNIX shell access. It just took less than 1 minute!!! Replace path names and database name with actual values.

In case, if something goes wrong, you can always restore old database and files from /backup/wp/080624 directory.

Strongly inspired from here.

Next time i’l try svn way…