1) General

Component Editor
Selective file loading
Reference locators and reference manipulation
Preserve references
Optimize scene size
Default file loading
Launching images and animations from Maya
Instance improvements
FCheck improvements
Online help improvements
Web browser in a panel

2) Modeling

Soft Modification
Mirror Cut
Smooth Proxy
Vertex Normal Edit Tool
Curve Editing Tools (from Hair)
Polygon Smooth
Polygon Proxy Mode
Polygon Bevel
Create Meshes Single Sided
UV Texture Editor
Split Polygon Tool
Curve/CV Selection
Convert NURBS to Polygons as Single Mesh
Scale/Rotate Components About Object Pivot Point
Rebuild Surfaces
Sculpt NURBS/Polygons Tools
makeIdentity
Annotation Node

3) Animation

Redesigned Trax Editor
Improved Trax Editor
New menu bar items
New tool bar icons
New track control area
Revised track view area
How do I use the new Trax Editor?
New Character Mapper window
Character > Character Mapper
How do I map animation from one character to another?
Redirecting animation
Redirecting motion
Miscellaneous improvements
New ways to manipulate keys and curves in the Graph Editor
Customize animation curve colors
Additional frame rates available
Control what types of objects are ghosted
Off-screen Playblast (IRIX and Linux only)
Advanced operations on animation in referenced files
Bake referenced animation
New MEL flags for importing and exporting animation

4) Character Setup

Retargeting animation
Skeleton > Set Neutral Pose
Skeleton > Assume Neutral Pose
Skeleton > Joint Labeller
Skeleton > Joint Labelling
How do I label my character's joints?
How do I retarget animation from one skeleton to another?
Skeleton > Retarget > r
General character setup improvements
Delete all non-skin history
Rigid bind allows binding to zero-weighted joints
Soft bind skinning affects normals
Deform > Soft Modification
Deform points outside the lattice
Sculpt deform with texture map
Restrict the direction of a surface's jiggle
Create a Cluster for each CV on a curve

5) Dynamics

Ability to deform particles
Per-particle field attributes
Per-particle goalU/goalV attributes for poly goal objects
Expression applied before and after dynamics
Multiple random number streams for particles
Textured surface emission for poly surface emitters
Ability to disable script output on particle events
Solvers > Interactive Playback
Parenting hinge constraints

6) Rendering

Adobe Photoshop file support
High quality interactive shading
Hypershade performance improvements
Organize render nodes with Hypershade sorting bins
Node filtering improvements in Hypershade
Hide shape and transform nodes in Hypershade
Test textures (and texture ranges) anytime
Disable the initial load of a file texture image
Maya software rendering
New color utility nodes
Imported shading network optimizations
Maya can now recognize new IMF plug-ins
Maya hardware rendering
Performance improvements for hardware rendering
Improved hardware plug-in shader support
mental ray for Maya rendering
mental ray shader manager
Simplified shader connection workflow
IPR rendering with mental ray for Maya
New features and support improvements
Support for Maya Fluids
Support for Maya Fur
Integrated contour rendering
Render blurry reflections and refractions
Rendering Image-Based Lighting (sky-like illumination)
Photon and Final Gather visualization maps
Render shader glow
Render particle motion blur
Improved Lightmap/CPV generation time
Light linking for custom nodes

7) Painting

Paint Effects :
Paint on Polygons
Isolating strokes for rendering
Artisan
Artisan Tools ported to the new architecture
New Paint Hair Tool
New Paint Cloth Collision Properties Tool
Sculpt Surfaces Tool improvements
Paint Scripts Tool improvements
3D Paint Tool
Paint Sculpt Map

8) Fluid Effects

Fluids cache performance enhancements
Control the creation of temporary fluids cache files
Segment the fluids cache
Advanced fluids cache segmenting
Troubleshooting the Fluids cache
Maya cannot read the fluids cache
Maya cannot find the current fluids cache
Maya is unable to create a playback cache for the current fluid
General Fluids improvements
Fluids render in mental ray for Maya

9) Fur

Rendering Fur in mental ray
Fur Equalizer Maps improvements
Fur on Subdivision Surfaces
Paint Fur Attributes Tool improvements
Fur Feedback improvements
Effect of lighting intensity on Fur

10) Cloth

Cloth objects
Cloth stress
Per-face collision depth
Stitch attribute for Cloth constraint
Mesh constraint improvements
Solver performance improvements
Advanced Cloth cache editing

11) Hair

Introducing Hair
Basic workflow for Hair
Creating Hair
Choosing which Hair curves to display
Selecting Hair, follicles and curves
Changing the Hair look
Making Hair collide
Setting up hair shading and shadowing
Rendering Hair
Adding a Paint Effects brush to Hair
Creating other models and effects with Hair

12) MEL

General improvements
New and improved commands
Script node improvements
Multiple random number streams
Selective load of references
Paint Scripts Tool improvements
Customizing Optimize Scene Size
New webBrowser command

13) Translator

New features in translators
png image file support
DWG translator improvements
STL import
OpenFlight on Mac OS X
StudioImport on Mac OS X

14) API and DevKit

API
Improvements to the Maya API
New classes and header files
Changes to existing classes
Examples of new plug-in functionality
Other Significant Changes
Compiler requirements
Devkit
Maya lists new IMF plug-ins