Please post client-side stuff (like CSS, JavaScript, and XHTML) questions to the client-side stuff forum.

The first sticky in the How To forum says "Point of this forum (please read before posting.)" Please read that before you post something else in How-To. You'll note that it clearly says, "If you have general CSS or XHTML questions, like "How do I make the links on my pages turn red when the mouse hovers over them?" then you should post on the Client-side Stuff forum." This is important because, if all the questions are in the right place, then everyone will find their answers more easily.

So, enough wrist-slapping, let's answer your question. :)

Depending on what skin you use, in _feedback.php, you'll find something that looks a little like this:

<span class="notes">Allowed
XHTML tags: ...

So, the CSS involved is

.notes { 
  color:#f00;
}

Of course, since you didn't provide a link, I'm really not sure what it is, but this method will serve you well: find the XHTML involved, and then use the [url=http://css.maxdesign.com.au/selectutorial/]appropriate selector[/url].

sorry, ity won't happen again :)

As for skins, i'm not really using one. whatever was installed, i just went straight ahead and edited the CSS file. I could not find the mentioned code in either the _feedback.php and the CSS. my site i'm having this problem on is http://www.cryocreations.com/beta If you want, i can post or PM you the code in my _feedback.php and my custom.css files.

Your _feedback.php is using the class called notes (I saw it by doing view source). I guess the .notes selector is in /rsc/comments.php.

To change this all you need to put in your custom.css is

.notes {
         color: #blah;
}

And this should override the default setting.

i tried adding that code in the CSS and nothing happened. although i was able to make the dotted box white via the comments.css. Perhaps i can have it change the text white too from the comments.css instead of the custom.css?

You could do, but that file is for global formatting, and any changes will affect all the skins that call that file. It is probably better to do it in custom.css, since the changes will be restricted to that skin.

ok, so what do i do to my CSS then? i added the script listed and nothing happened. any other suggestions?

Just for clarity, did you actually put "color: #blah;" like Graham posted, or did you change #blah to an actual color, like #fff?

Sorry if I'm way off base here.

Nope. Viewsource showed ".notes { color: #FFFFFF }". The file that sets that stuff up is /rsc/forms.css and contains the following:

fieldset span.notes {
	font-size: 80%;
	color: #999;
}

I would suggest you duplicate that in your custom.css file, meaning change your thing from ".notes" to "fieldset span.notes". I think, but I'm not sure, that it is saying "okay he's got this really specific fieldset span.notes thing and later on he's got this generic .notes thing so I'll just follow the detailed instruction". Therefore duplicate the detail level and you will overpower it's desire to do what it wants to do. You don't have to duplicate the font-size declaration unless you want to change it. It will keep the font-size declaration even though you are changing the color declaration - it just keeps adding them all together using the last instruction for any given aspect.

ahh, there we go. You da man EdB :D

Thanks to everyone for all the help, you guys are the best!

EdB's exactly right - this whole issue was over specificity.

fieldset span.notes has a specificity of 012 (0 ids, 1 class, 2 elements.)
.notes has a specificity of 010 (0 ids, 1 class, 0 elements.)
In a conflict, 12 beats 10. When in doubt, try making your selector more specific. (Adding an !important declaration is good to test what's going on, since that trumps everything that isn't !important, but IE doesn't even notice, so it's not good to rely upon permanently.)

I think it's a good idea for anyone who was confused by this issue to take a moment and [url=http://css.maxdesign.com.au/selectutorial/advanced_conflict.htm]learn a few of the finer points of css[/url]. Once you understand what's so "cascading" about cascading style sheets, these sorts of things make a lot more sense.

B)