function makeRequest(url, elemname) {
	
	switchMessageWindowLoadStatus();

	var httpRequest;

	if (window.XMLHttpRequest) { // Mozilla, Safari, ...
		httpRequest = new XMLHttpRequest();
		if (httpRequest.overrideMimeType) {
			// httpRequest.overrideMimeType('text/html;charset=utf-8');
			// See note below about this line
		}
	} else if (window.ActiveXObject) { // IE
		try {
			httpRequest = new ActiveXObject("Msxml2.XMLHTTP");
		} 
		catch (e) {
			try {
				httpRequest = new ActiveXObject("Microsoft.XMLHTTP");
			} 
			catch (e) {
			}
		}
	}

	if (!httpRequest) {
		alert('Giving up :( Cannot create an XMLHTTP instance');
		return false;
	}
	
	httpRequest.onreadystatechange = function() { 
		loadContents(httpRequest, elemname); 
	};
	
	httpRequest.open('GET', url, true);
	
	// Code below makes IE6 fail
	// if (httpRequest.setRequestHeader) {
		// httpRequest.setRequestHeader("Content-Type", "text/html");
		// httpRequest.setRequestHeader("charset", "utf-8");
	//}
	
	httpRequest.send(null);

}

function alertContents(httpRequest, elemname) {

	if (httpRequest.readyState == 4) {
		if (httpRequest.status == 200) {
			alert(httpRequest.responseText);
		} else {
			alert('There was a problem with the request.');
		}
	}

}

function loadContents(httpRequest, elemname) {

	if (httpRequest.readyState == 4) {
		if (httpRequest.status == 200) {
			
			var obj = document.getElementById(elemname);
			obj.innerHTML = httpRequest.responseText;
			obj.style.height = 'auto';
			
		} else {
			alert('There was a problem with the request.');
		}
	}

}

function URLEncode(plaintext)
{
	// The Javascript escape and unescape functions do not correspond
	// with what browsers actually do...
	var SAFECHARS = "0123456789" +					// Numeric
					"ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ" +	// Alphabetic
					"abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz" +
					"-_.!~*'()";					// RFC2396 Mark characters
	var HEX = "0123456789ABCDEF";

	var encoded = "";
	for (var i = 0; i < plaintext.length; i++ ) {
		var ch = plaintext.charAt(i);
	    if (ch == " ") {
		    encoded += "+";				// x-www-urlencoded, rather than %20
		} else if (SAFECHARS.indexOf(ch) != -1) {
		    encoded += ch;
		} else {
		    var charCode = ch.charCodeAt(0);
			if (charCode > 255) {
			    alert( "Unicode Character '" 
                        + ch 
                        + "' cannot be encoded using standard URL encoding.\n" +
				          "(URL encoding only supports 8-bit characters.)\n" +
						  "A space (+) will be substituted." );
				encoded += "+";
			} else {
				encoded += "%";
				encoded += HEX.charAt((charCode >> 4) & 0xF);
				encoded += HEX.charAt(charCode & 0xF);
			}
		}
	} // for

	return encoded;
};

function URLDecode(encoded)
{
   // Replace + with ' '
   // Replace %xx with equivalent character
   // Put [ERROR] in output if %xx is invalid.
   var HEXCHARS = "0123456789ABCDEFabcdef"; 

   var plaintext = "";
   var i = 0;
   while (i < encoded.length) {
       var ch = encoded.charAt(i);
	   if (ch == "+") {
	       plaintext += " ";
		   i++;
	   } else if (ch == "%") {
			if (i < (encoded.length-2) 
					&& HEXCHARS.indexOf(encoded.charAt(i+1)) != -1 
					&& HEXCHARS.indexOf(encoded.charAt(i+2)) != -1 ) {
				plaintext += unescape( encoded.substr(i,3) );
				i += 3;
			} else {
				alert( 'Bad escape combination near ...' + encoded.substr(i) );
				plaintext += "%[ERROR]";
				i++;
			}
		} else {
		   plaintext += ch;
		   i++;
		}
	} // while
   return plaintext;
};