Utilities_getCookie = function(c_name)
{
    if (document.cookie.length>0)
      {
      c_start=document.cookie.indexOf(c_name + "=")
      if (c_start!=-1)
        { 
        c_start=c_start + c_name.length+1 
        c_end=document.cookie.indexOf(";",c_start)
        if (c_end==-1) c_end=document.cookie.length
        return unescape(document.cookie.substring(c_start,c_end))
        } 
      }
    return ""
}

Utilities_setCookie = function(c_name,value,expiredays)
{
    var exdate=new Date()
    exdate.setDate(exdate.getDate()+expiredays)
    document.cookie=c_name+ "=" +escape(value)+
    ((expiredays==null) ? "" : ";expires="+exdate.toGMTString())
}
    

Utilities_trim = function(inputString) {
   // Removes leading and trailing spaces from the passed string. Also removes
   // consecutive spaces and replaces it with one space. If something besides
   // a string is passed in (null, custom object, etc.) then return the input.
   if (typeof inputString != "string") { return inputString; }
   var retValue = inputString;
   var ch = retValue.substring(0, 1);
   while (ch == " ") { // Check for spaces at the beginning of the string
      retValue = retValue.substring(1, retValue.length);
      ch = retValue.substring(0, 1);
   }
   ch = retValue.substring(retValue.length-1, retValue.length);
   while (ch == " ") { // Check for spaces at the end of the string
      retValue = retValue.substring(0, retValue.length-1);
      ch = retValue.substring(retValue.length-1, retValue.length);
   }
   while (retValue.indexOf("  ") != -1) { // Note that there are two spaces in the string - look for multiple spaces within the string
      retValue = retValue.substring(0, retValue.indexOf("  ")) + retValue.substring(retValue.indexOf("  ")+1, retValue.length); // Again, there are two spaces in each of the strings
   }
   return retValue; // Return the trimmed string back to the user
} // Ends the "trim" function



Utilities_Set_Cookie = function( name, value, expires, path, domain) 
{
// set time, it's in milliseconds
var today = new Date();
today.setTime( today.getTime() );

/*
if the expires variable is set, make the correct 
expires time, the current script below will set 
it for x number of days, to make it for hours, 
delete * 24, for minutes, delete * 60 * 24
*/
if ( expires )
{
expires = expires * 1000 * 60 * 60 * 24;
}
var expires_date = new Date( today.getTime() + (expires) );

document.cookie = name + "=" +escape( value ) +
( ( expires ) ? ";expires=" + expires_date.toGMTString() : "" ) + 
( ( path ) ? ";path=" + path : "" ) + 
( ( domain ) ? ";domain=" + domain : "" );
};