those colored rows in phpMyAdmin

Pete,

There are a few different ways of doing this, some are complicated, and some are REALLY complicated lol.

In a JavaScript DOM (Document Object Model) Compliant browser such as IE5+, NN6+, Mozilla, Camino... you can use the DOM to access certain nodes (layers, divs, headers, spans) in your document and change their styles on the fly. For example:

<div id="changeMe">Text</div>

You want to change its background color when you mouseover the element... add some of this code:

<div id="changeMe" onmouseover="document.getElementById( 'changeMe' ).style.backgroundColor = '#FFC';">Text</div>

By adding that JavaScript handler and code into that div, now when the user mouses over it, the JavaScript code is executed. This code targets this exact layer (id="changeMe"), and changes its backgroundColor property. This is the JavaScript DHTML equivalent of saying this:

#changeMe { background-color: #FFC; } in the header of the document.

DHTML using the Document Object Model is the dynamic JavaScript way to change the styles of certain page elements when you want to, on the fly.

There are lots of good resources on the web regarding using DHTML and the DOM, start out at webmonkey

-Mike