About The Cookies Used On This Web Site

• None of the cookies used on this web site constitute any form of personal privacy or computer security risk.  They have nothing to do with advertising and they track nothing and do not accumulate nor report any statistics. They do not hold any kind of private information or even count your page visits.
  
  The reason I can state this with such authority is because I programmed this web site and know everything that is going on at all levels internally.  There are no tricks.
  
  This information page was written to certify and clarify exactly how cookies are used here, what they are used for and why.
  
  Like most web sites, some of the web pages on this site use cookies.  There are also many pages that do not.  In most cases, when a certain web page uses a cookie, this will generally be clearly stated on the page somewhere and the purpose for which the cookie is used. 

• A cookie is a simple text file (4K limit each) which can be used like a mutual scratchpad to read/write and pass small blocks of text information back and forth between your web browser and the web site.  This cookie is stored on your computer, not on the web site.  Sometimes it is necessary for a client (you) to be able to at least minimally interact with a web site in order for it to render its services to the best effect.


• Used properly, cookies are useful for such things as remembering certain essential information while connected to the host web site, such as your user settings and preferences or whether or not you are still logged-in, etc.  In many cases, this information may be considered obsolete and deleted without consequence after leaving the web site.


• Each program that uses cookies can create its own independent cookie or create a shared cookie that several programs running on the same web site can use in common, so it is possible to have more than one cookie from this or any other web site on your computer at any given time.  This is perfectly normal.

• Obviously, like a cigarette lighter, cookies can be used for any number of things, potentially good or bad.  It depends entirely on the programmer and the agenda.  The cookies are stored on your local computer by your web browser, provided that you have not disabled or blocked cookies.


• It is inadvisable to blindly fear cookies and simply block them all without exception.  A cookie can not reformat your hard drive or erase or steal files or physically damage a computer in any way - nothing that drastic, even when they are used for most nefarious purposes.


• When cookies are used for questionable purposes, it is usually to help capture personal information (if you were induced to have provided it) and/or track your clicks and travels and to analyze your movements and actions as you navigate the Internet by using data stored in cookies associated with some form of unique ID code that can be followed from web site to web site by various kinds of sneaky tracking software.  This is where the issue of privacy originates with respect to the use of cookies.  It depends entirely on the integrity and motives of the web site owners and/or operators


• None of that devious, underhanded nonsense goes on here.

• Some of the interfaces on this web site use cookies to store and remember the current settings between subsequent calls, in case you leave the web site or shut down the browser and come back later.  That's it.


• If no cookie is found or it was 30 days or more since your last visit, then a new cookie is created and initialized, unless disabled.  If cookies are disabled in your browser, then the interface will always be initialized with the default current date (according to GMT), since it will not be able to remember any previous date settings without the cookie.


• Any cookies created by this web site will automatically expire in 30 days if not used in that time period, as long as you do not delete the cookies before then  This means that the next time you return to the interface that created it, the settings will be recalled from the cookie created on your previous visit as long as the cookie has not expired or been deleted.


• The cookie expires only if it is not re-used for 30 days or more.  Otherwise, every time a cookie is re-visited, its expiration date is automatically renewed again to 30 days from the moment of access.