Next article highlighting some new features which will come in phpMyAdmin 3.4 is about more little changes. You can try them it out on our demo server. Or just wait few hours for first alpha release of 3.4.
The user interface cleanup is partly connected with previous changes, because some functionality simply required more Javascript (for example editor for ENUM/SET fields). Besides these there were major changes in export and import pages, which now should be easier to understand, hiding advanced options from unexperienced users, while still providing ability to change them.
This feature was implemented by Lori Lee during Google Summer of Code 2010.
As much as I like the AJAXification of the new version, I think there needs to be some thought into how to handle the options of what to do after editing. From what I can see, the options to "Go back to previous page" etc no longer work. Could the first "Go" button process the edit etc via ajax, but the Go button next to these options process things the old way? Regardless, something needs to be done to fix this.