2 files changed, 81 insertions, 1 deletions

diff --git a/web/input/news/release-3-0-0.md b/web/input/news/release-3-0-0.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..85c7982
--- /dev/null
+++ b/web/input/news/release-3-0-0.md
@@ -0,0 +1,80 @@
+title: Version 3.0.0-rc1 Released
+author: Lorenz Kästle
+date: 2025-12-03
+---
+
+The Monitoring Plugins Development Team announces version 3.0.0-rc1 of
+the Monitoring Plugins! 
+This release is different in several regards to previous releases.
+Due the a significant refactoring and the unintented side effect this
+may have, the "real" release will be following release candidates which
+are intented to for early adapters and testing.
+<end-of-teaser>
+
+The core parts of this release are significant changes to the C part of this
+project, which should be mostly internal and not change the results in a
+significant way (meaning the input parameters mostly stay as they are and the
+exit code should remain the same if the parameters are the same in the old
+version and context did not change).
+The reality is, that big changes have
+unintented consequences which are not covered in the test cases or some
+consequences were not in our scope at all.
+For the list of notable changes in this release, see below.
+
+You can get the tarball from our [download page][download].
+
+### General changes
+* In the C part of the project
+  * Heavy refactoring to simplify and unify the code base
+  * Introduction of a generalized output mechanism for most plugins
+  * Standardized code formatting via `clang-format`
+
+### Specific changes 
+#### check_curl
+`check_curl` received a lot of changes which improve the documentation and
+fix several bugs.
+It is also not considered experimental anymore.
+
+Additionaly `check_curl` can now be configured to handle cookies internally
+without saving cookies to the filesystem.
+
+#### check_http
+`check_http` is now considered deprecated and will not receive attention any
+more. It is replaced by `check_curl`
+
+#### check_snmp
+`check_snmp` does not execute `snmpget` or `snmpgetnext` anymore but executes
+the net-snmp calls natively now.
+
+#### check_nwstat
+`check_nwstat` was removed, due to its perceived insignificance in the current
+IT world. This reduces the maintenance load and ressource consumption in
+general.
+
+#### check_by_ssh
+`check_by_ssh` ignores output on `stderr` by default now. This should
+avoid false positives for warnings by the OpenSSH client (especially
+about the server missing Post-Quantum cryptography.
+
+#### check_dns
+`check_dns` now ignores CNAMES in reverse DNS mode.
+
+#### check_fping
+If during compilation `fping` 5.2, 5.3 or higher are present, `check_fping` 
+will be able to use new options which were introduced with these versions.
+These options are (equivalent to the ones with the same name in `fping`)
+`--fwmark`, `--icmp-timestamp` and `--check-source`.
+The older flags `--dontfrag` and `--random` were also added.
+
+Also the `-4` and `-6` flags may not have worked as intented and should be
+fixed now.
+
+#### check_mysql
+`check_mysql` should now be able to correctly detect whether a replica is
+attached and working correctly.
+Changes were necessary here to adapt to changes in the naming convention in
+MySQL.
+
+[download]: /download.html
+
+<!--% # vim:set filetype=markdown textwidth=78 joinspaces expandtab: # %-->
diff --git a/web/macros.py b/web/macros.py
index 5536f3f..3eb1046 100644
--- a/web/macros.py
+++ b/web/macros.py
@@ -3,7 +3,7 @@ import math
 import os.path
 import time
 
-plugins_release = '2.4.0'
+plugins_release = '3.0.0-rc1'
 mib_release = '1.0.1'
 release_notes = 'news/release-%s.html' % plugins_release.replace('.', '-')
 site_url = 'https://www.monitoring-plugins.org/'