Configuration
DNN now has a new, cleaner skin selection. New are a TopPane and a BottomPane you can use for additional flexibility in placing content. This is a nice addition as many sites use top/bottom content spanning sections. If you don't need these, simply don't place any information into them and they'll collapse into nothing at runtime.

The default skin in v3 is limited width. You can change this to full width by going into Admin | Site Settings | Appearance and choosing a different Portal Skin. There also are a variety of colors available to choose from in the new skin package.

Portal Admins will notice a new icon bar at the top of the pages. There's a Page Functions section on the left that gives you shortcuts to commonly used Page (formerly called Tab) functions. The center section deals with modules, and the Common Tasks section on the right provide shortcuts to commonly used Admin functions, including the new Site Wizard for importing a portal template.

Here's the things I feel are important to configure first in your portals (go back and examine the other settings after you get the following done):

• Host:
  • Host Settings | Basic Settings | Host Details: set Host Title, Host URL, Host Email
  • Host Settings | Basic Settings | Appearance: uncheck Show Copyright Credits (removes version in Title bar)
  • Host Settings | Advanced Settings | Proxy Settings: set this section up if you need a proxy configuration in your network.
  • Host Settings | Advanced Settings | SMTP Server Settings: if you're using the default SMTP configuration on the server you can leave these settings alone. Set this section up if your site will send email using a non-default configuration (you may need to contact customer support at your web host for assistance).
  • Host Settings | Advanced Settings | Other Settings: set Skin Upload permission to Portal (so the portal admin can upload skins) 
  • Host Settings | Advanced Settings | Other Settings: check the Use Friendly URLs checkbox to make your site more friendly to search engines. This is now the default setting in v3. Here's a great forum post describing some of the issues around friendly URLs (called FURLs in the post).
• Portal Admin:
  • Site Settings | Basic Settings | Site Details: Title, Description
  • Site Settings | Advanced Settings | Security Settings: set User Registration to the desired value (None, Private, Public, Verified)
  • Site Settings | Advanced Settings | Other Settings: set the Copyright, Banner Advertising = None, Administrator account, default language, and Portal TimeZone

Site Templates and Module Export/Import
One of the coolest new features in v3 is the ability to export and import content from your portals. As the portal host, you can export the layout and content (optionally) of an entire portal into a template (use the Host | Portals | Export Template control). This template can be imported to another portal using the new site wizard (in the admin IconBar at the top right of each page).

You can also export/import the content of modules using the dropdown Module controls menu. Note that for you to see the export/import menu items, the module must support the new IPortable interface (most standard modules do). Use this feature to preserve or transfer the content of modules to other modules in the same or different portals.