complete newbie. i know nothing. help!?

[dyanamaria]

So, I have this blog that a friend set up for me - I've got the full administrative access. It looks like it's running Serendipity v.0.7.1.

That said, I've been trying to customize my blog for a while now. I know nothing of CSS and very little HTML - but I've been reading about it, and am pretty sure I know where to plug in all the necessary codes to get what I want to happen. Nothing fancy really.

Only problem is that with the 8 options my admin menu offers I can't find anything that will allow me to modify my blog outside of picking a new template. I don't have access to my friend's server. That's all his stuff, he's just giving me a bunch of free space on it. Am I doomed to never be able to do anything without that access? Or is there a secret way of doing things that I haven't figured out yet.

Thanks!

(ps. use whatever jargon you need to explain things to me - I'll look up whatever I don't understand)

[garvinhicking]

You will need to update to Serendipity 0.9. It offers you full customization with Smarty HTML templating, as described in the manual of www.s9y.org.

But you need at least FTP access to the serendipity installation to perform changes on the themes/templates. Without it, you cannot change that.

You can, however, go to the plugin configuration panel and add some "HTML Nugget" sidebar items there which already allow you some flexibility.

Regards,
Garvin