//  The following functions are released to the public domain.
   
    function getCookieVal (offset) {
      var endstr = document.cookie.indexOf (";", offset);
      if (endstr == -1)
        endstr = document.cookie.length;
      return unescape(document.cookie.substring(offset, endstr));
    }

//
//  Function to return the value of the cookie specified by "name".
//    name - String object containing the cookie name.
//    returns - String object containing the cookie value, or null if
//      the cookie does not exist.
 
    function GetCookie (name) {
      var arg = name + "=";
      var alen = arg.length;
      var clen = document.cookie.length;
      var i = 0;
      while (i < clen) {
        var j = i + alen;
        if (document.cookie.substring(i, j) == arg)
          return getCookieVal (j);
        i = document.cookie.indexOf(" ", i) + 1;
        if (i == 0) break; 
      }
      return null;
    }