Theme development

I'm trying to implement this technique automatically to my nodes: http://www.mandarindesign.com/troops.html

At the moment, I'm using it while adding the nodes.

Do I need to build a hook to get the first character of the node, and put it into a different div class, for that style?

I'm having a problem with Democratica. There is a long white space at the bottom of the front page and also when you click on Logs, Blocks or Theme the details goes to the bottom of the page leaving a long white space on the top.

i've tried the coding on this link http://drupal.org/node/88972# but it didn't help.

Can somebody please tell me how I can resolve this?

Thanks
Kem

Is there a way to configure a theme to only allow certain users to access it? Say for instance that I'm trying to create a new theme on a site, and only want a small group of beta testers to be able to use it while it's under development. Is there a setting anywhere to only grant access to a theme to the users in a "beta test" role?

Is there any way to get the zen theme to expand to the full width of a page? It seems to be set to 1024 or something similiar

Is there any way to get a static content page to show up at the top of the front page of a pushbutton-themed site? I cant seem to get a static page to show up first, it shows up at the bottom of the page?

Hi,

I am going to have the Drupal script downloaded and need an appropriate Theme for the portal, hence the post.