Understanding what goes on with textarea selection with JavaScript

function get_selection(the_id)
{
    var e = document.getElementById(the_id);

    //Mozilla and DOM 3.0
    if('selectionStart' in e)
    {
        var l = e.selectionEnd - e.selectionStart;
        return { start: e.selectionStart, end: e.selectionEnd, length: l, text: e.value.substr(e.selectionStart, l) };
    }
    //IE
    else if(document.selection)
    {
        e.focus();
        var r = document.selection.createRange();
        var tr = e.createTextRange();
        var tr2 = tr.duplicate();
        tr2.moveToBookmark(r.getBookmark());
        tr.setEndPoint('EndToStart',tr2);
        if (r == null || tr == null) return { start: e.value.length, end: e.value.length, length: 0, text: '' };
        var text_part = r.text.replace(/[\r\n]/g,'.'); //for some reason IE doesn't always count the \n and \r in the length
        var text_whole = e.value.replace(/[\r\n]/g,'.');
        var the_start = text_whole.indexOf(text_part,tr.text.length);
        return { start: the_start, end: the_start + text_part.length, length: text_part.length, text: r.text };
    }
    //Browser not supported
    else return { start: e.value.length, end: e.value.length, length: 0, text: '' };
}

function replace_selection(the_id,replace_str)
{
    var e = document.getElementById(the_id);
    selection = get_selection(the_id);
    var start_pos = selection.start;
    var end_pos = start_pos + replace_str.length;
    e.value = e.value.substr(0, start_pos) + replace_str + e.value.substr(selection.end, e.value.length);
    set_selection(the_id,start_pos,end_pos);
    return {start: start_pos, end: end_pos, length: replace_str.length, text: replace_str};
}

function set_selection(the_id,start_pos,end_pos)
{
    var e = document.getElementById(the_id);

    //Mozilla and DOM 3.0
    if('selectionStart' in e)
    {
        e.focus();
        e.selectionStart = start_pos;
        e.selectionEnd = end_pos;
    }
    //IE
    else if(document.selection)
    {
        e.focus();
        var tr = e.createTextRange();

        //Fix IE from counting the newline characters as two seperate characters
        var stop_it = start_pos;
        for (i=0; i < stop_it; i++) if( e.value[i].search(/[\r\n]/) != -1 ) start_pos = start_pos - .5;
        stop_it = end_pos;
        for (i=0; i < stop_it; i++) if( e.value[i].search(/[\r\n]/) != -1 ) end_pos = end_pos - .5;

        tr.moveEnd('textedit',-1);
        tr.moveStart('character',start_pos);
        tr.moveEnd('character',end_pos - start_pos);
        tr.select();
    }
    return get_selection(the_id);
}

function wrap_selection(the_id, left_str, right_str, sel_offset, sel_length)
{
    var the_sel_text = get_selection(the_id).text;
    var selection =  replace_selection(the_id, left_str + the_sel_text + right_str );
    if(sel_offset !== undefined && sel_length !== undefined) selection = set_selection(the_id, selection.start +  sel_offset, selection.start +  sel_offset + sel_length);
    else if(the_sel_text == '') selection = set_selection(the_id, selection.start + left_str.length, selection.start + left_str.length);
    return selection;
}