if (!cookies_js)
{
	var cookies_js = true
	
	// setCookie(): creates a cookie
	function setCookie(cookieName,expiresMonths)
	{
		try
		{
			var e					= document.getElementById('username')
			var username			= e.value
			var expirationDate		= new Date()
			var laterMonth
			if (expiresMonths)
			{
				laterMonth			= expirationDate.getMonth()+expiresMonths
				expirationDate.setMonth(laterMonth)							// expire in user specified months
			}
			
			// writing to document.cookie will cause it to place this new cookie among the existing ones you've set
			// you won't overwrite what's there unless you try to assign an empty value to a name and set its expiration to a past date
			document.cookie				=	cookieName+ "=" +
										escape(username) +					// no commas, semicolons, spaces allowed in cookie name-value pair
										";expires=" +
										expirationDate.toGMTString()		// expires is a special name
		}
		catch (err)
		{
		}
	}

	// unsetCookie():  deletes a cookie
	function unsetCookie(cookieName)
	{
		var pastDate = new Date()
		pastDate.setTime(pastDate.getTime()-1)								// one second before now
		// overwrite the cookie by assigning a null value and setting expiration to a past date
		document.cookie = cookieName+"=;expires="+pastDate.toGMTString()	// causes the cookie to expire immediately
	}

	// getCookie(): retrieves a cookie
	function getCookie(cookieName)
	{
		var startPos, endPos, value
		var stringToFind = cookieName
		
		startPos	= document.cookie.indexOf(stringToFind)
		if (startPos>=0)
		{
			startPos	+= stringToFind.length + 1							// move startPos past the end of "username="
			endPos		= document.cookie.indexOf(";",startPos)				// find the semi-colon separator. begin searching from startPos
			if (endPos<0)
			{
				endPos = document.cookie.length								// no semi-colon. i.e. single name-value pair
			}
		}

		value = document.cookie.substring(startPos,endPos)					// grab the value out of the string
		value = unescape(value)												// remove the web encoding

		return value

	}
  
	// getCookie(): retrieves a cookie by way of regular expressions
	function getCookieRegEx (cookieName)
	{
		var results = document.cookie.match ( cookieName + '=([^;])[;]?' )

		if (results)
		{
			return ( unescape ( results[1] ) )
		}
		
		return null
	}

} // end run once