Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz
שמואל בן ל״ביש

Under construction

Welcome to the homepage of Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz,
http://www.mason.gmu.edu/~smetz3.

E-mail to the owner of this account may be addressed to smetz3@GMU.EDU.

• Good Bosses
• gaslighters
• humor
• Personal
• Professional
• Politics
• Publications
• Spam Fighting

Good Bosses

The Internet is full of stories about bad bosses. I believe that it is time that the good bosses got some notice.

• At a small Army base, I worked in the DP section of the Comptroler’s office for a warrant officer who:
  • Knew what he wanted.
  • Ensured that we understood what he wanted.
  • Demanded that we give hime wht he wanted No, he was by no means a martinet; he was friendly and informal, as long as we did our jobs.
  • Got out of our way and let us do what he asked of us.
  • Had our backs.
  That may not sound like much, but I greatly appreciated him, and I’ve worked for bosses where none of those was the case. Mr. Condon, it was a pleasure to work with you.
• At a Federal Government data center, we had a system crash, and all the managers clustered around the console getting underfoot. The project manager asked who was actually working on the problem, and ordered everybody else out of the computer room. That greatly speeded recovery, and my respect for him went up a notch.
• At a Federal Government data center, we did periodic disaster recovery (DR) tests. My boss on the government side would:
  • Bring half a dozen copies of the Stand Alone Restore (FDRSAR) tape and ask me if that was enough.
  • Order me to take a nap when I wasn’t needed.
  • Pull a random tape, tell us to consider it lost, and proceed with the test without it.
  • Point to a random member of the test team, declare him dead, and proceed with the test without him.
  The first two made a successful test more likely, and the last two made it more likely that we would catch problem in our recovery documentation.

Gaslighters

You may be a gaslighter if you say

• After all I’ve done for you.
• Are you saying that …?
• Be reasonable.
• Be the bigger man.
• common sense
• Do it for the family.
• Don’t be silly.
• Don’t be so sensitive.
• Don't blow it up all out of all proportion.
• Don’t over react.
• Don’t take it personally.
• Don’t take it so seriously.
• Don’t you trust me?
• Everything will be the same.
• Everything will go back to normal.
• He’s just flirting.
• I can explain it.
• I can’t do everything at once.
• I didn’t change a thing.
• I didn’t know you were unhappy
• I didn’t mean for it to happen.
• I didn’t mean that.
• I didn’t mean to hurt you.
• I love you equally.
• I gave you everything you wanted.
• I meant well.
• I never knew you were unhappy.
• I never wanted to hurt you.
• I treat all of you the same.
• I was just trying to help.
• I’ll let you take comp time.
• I’ll make it up to you.
• I’ll promote you next year.
• I’m just borrowing.
• I’m not trying to hurt you.
• I’m only human.
• I’ve always been there for you.
• If there were a bug someone would have spotted it by now.
• If you loved me you’d let me do it.
• In other words, ….
• It doesn’t mean anything.
• It doesn’t mean I don’t love you.
• It has nothing to do with you.
• It just happened.
• It only happened once.
• It was a mistake.
• It was an honest mistake.
• It will be in the budget next year.
• It will be just the same.
• It will never happen again.
• It’s for your own good.
• It’s just a bump in the road.
• It’s just a joke.
• It’s just this once.
• It’s just where you left it.
• It’s never failed before.
• It’s no big deal.
• It’s not like that.
• It’s not personal.
• It’s not what it looks like..
• It’s not what you think.
• It’s only temporary.
• It’s the first time.
• Let me explain.
• Let’s be calm.
• Let’s calm down.
• Lighten up.
• Man up.
• Nobody else has reported that problem.
• Nobody has ever complained about that before.
• Nothing will change.
• Nothing&squo;s going on.
• She means well.
• That's different.
• Think about it rationally.
• This is just a misunderstanding.
• We can fix this.
• We can get over this.
• We can move past this.
• We take it very seriously.
• We will keep all of the old management and policies in place.
• Why are you making such a fuss out of it?
• Why didn’t you tell me you were unhappy?
• You just don’t undertand.
• You over reacted.
• You’re Imagining things.
• You’re old fashioned.
• You’re over reacting.
• You’re overthinking things
• You’re selfish.
• You’re the only one to complain about that.
• You’re the only one to have that problem.
• You’re too controlling
• You’re too sensitive.
• You’re too suspicious.

Mind you, many of these are true some of the time, so don’t automatically discount them, but treat them as red flags.

Humor

Some T-shirt designs I’ve come up with, most of which are available from CafePress

• My other car is an A-10
• My other car is an SR-72
• Dirac wave equation
• Ortho DOX and Para DOX
• Why Women Can’t Do Mathematics
• The only Trigonometry I needed to know
• GR field equations wuth Cosmological term
• My father’s manse has many Hessians
• Houseboat
• Visual pun
• Large cardinal
• A man’s P should exceed his V
• Party of Treason
• RFC 1149
• Can you Cache a small Czech?
• Spoiler
  Explanations

Cartoons I enjoy

• My all time favorite is the swing from Datamation. I don’t have a link to the original, but here are some links to derived versions:
  • Tree swing cartoon pictures (early versions)
  • The Project Management Tree Swing Cartoon, Past and Present
• Pillage then burn from the Wizard of Id
• Work Diligently with Integrity - You’ll Get Your Just Reward
• Then, of course, there is Dilbert
  In particular, Eunix
• Many cartton by Gahan Allen Wilson, especially his Christmas card

Some verse I get a chuckle from
Warning: here there be sarcasm and politics.

• A Boy Named Sue
• A Sea Dirge
• An Elegy on the Death of a Mad Dog
• Anatevka, my version (אַנאַטעווקאַ)
• Causae Bibendi
• “Come, come,” said Tom’s father, “at your time of life”
• Donald Verbeck
• GOP Treason
• Lying "Fake News"
• Michael Braun , sung to Charlie Brown
• Mrs. Judge Jenkins
• My Favorite Things, My version
• Oh No, John!
• Dr. Freud
• Preventive Service (PUT Process)
• Terence, this is stupid stuff
• The Button Pusher
• The Goose and the Commons
• The Modern Hiawatha
• The Purist
• When I Was One and Twenty
  
• Anything byThomas Andrew Lehrer
• Anything byRandy Stewart Rainbow
• Many songs by Three Dead Trolls in a Baggie
• Spoiler
  Explanations

Miscellaneous funny writings

• Anything by Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce
• Anything by Hector Hugh Munro ( Saki)
• Anything by Dorothy Parker (née Rothschild)
• Art Buchwald’s classic Explaining Thanksgiving to the French

Personal

I’m married with two daughters and have eclectic but idiosyncratic interests. Among other things, I enjoy.

1. Bridge, although I haven’t played in years.
2. Chess, although I haven’t played in years.
3. Classical music, especially large orchestral works of the Romantic period and later. I don’t, however, go in for things like 12 tone.
4. Computer architectures
5. Ethnic cuisine.
6. Fantasy, preferably humorous
7. Folk songs, especially labor and protest.
   • Bob Dylan
   • Phil Ochs
   • Thomas Richard Paxton
   • Pete Seeger
8. Mathematics
9. Musical Theatre
10. Operating systems
11. Pets - I’m one of those people that like both cats and dogs, as well as some less common species.
12. Programming languages
13. Puns and other word play
    1. Ferdinand Feghoot
       Through Time and Space with Ferdinand Feghoot , Reginald Bretnor
    2. Haddocks’ Eyes , Through the Looking-Glass, chapter VIII
    3. Uncleftish Beholding , Poul Anderson, Analog Science Fiction and Fact. Vol. 109, no. 13. Davis Publications. pp. 132-135.
14. Science
15. Science Fiction, preferably hard
16. Theatre

I’ve attended Cass Technical High School in Detroit, Wayne State University" (WSU) in Detroit and State University of New York at Buffalo (SUNY/AB), now University at Buffalo, in Amherst.

Professional

I am a senior systems programmer and software developer with experience on a wide variety of languages and platforms. I have participated in the design and development of two operating systems, and am familiar with low level details of several communications protocols. My experience is heaviest on MVS and VM, but is not limited to IBM platforms.

For more information on my background, click on brief résumé, recent CV or full CV.

Sample code:

• STOWBLDL subroutine to allow PL/I I/O to multiple members of a PDS with a single OPEN.
  Needs private macros and IBM macros.
• Quick and dirty UNOBFUSCATE Perl script to analyze e-mail for spam reporting.
• Prefix macros for THE and XEDIT
  • THE and XEDIT macro for HLASM
  • THE and XEDIT macro for REXX
  • Profile to issue SET SYNONYM

Documentation:

• Prefix macros for THE and XEDIT Source ODT
• Slides for prefix macro demo Source ODT

Publications

orcid.org/0000-0002-6358-8257

• A PC Neophyte’s Guide to Self Defense, PC Systems & Support (October 1993)
• Practicing Safe REXX, OS/2 Magazine, Volume 2 Number 2 (February 1995) or view part 1 and part 2 from the REXLA web site
• Local Coordinate Spaces: a proposed unification of manifolds with fiber bundles, and associated machinery, arXiv reference number 1801.05775
• Towards a taxonomy of atlases and of morphisms between them, arXiv reference number 1906.11690

Spam Fighting

Take the Boulder Pledge. Click for more info.

If you are having a problem with spam, you may find these links to be useful.

• Good starting places:
  • SPAM-L FAQ, half SPAM-L, half general
  • News.Admin.Net-Abuse.Email FAQ (lots of good links)
  • Erol’s anti-spam links
  • CAUCE
• Some links to vocabulary
  • Ed Falk’s Spam glossary
  • The Net Abuse Jargon File
  • NANAE FAQ: Colloquialisms
  • SPAM-L FAQ: Glossary and other resources
• Reading headers
  • Tutorial
• Some useful lists of links.
  • Rex Tincher’s anti-spam (junk email) links and information
  • Spam Links is an anti-spam links site
  • More anti-spam links (old)
• Tools
  • Script to locate contact data for spam complaint. Unobfuscates by decoding, e.g., BASE64, QP, %xx.
    Stable version.

Politics

דַבֵּר אֶמֶת לְכֺּחַ

• All Lives Matter
• Fight sexism
• GOP treason
• I have a dream
• Russian piece (sic) proposals
• Stop the hypocisy
• Support our troops - not ...
• Support your local police but ...

I Have a Dream

I have a dream that we elect a Black, female, handicaped, Hispanic, Jewish, left handed, short president and nobody finds it unusual.

Stop the hypocrisy

Antisemitism is not a progressive value.

Borrow-and-spend is not a conservative value.

Male bashing is not a feminiost value.

Misogeny is not a male-pride value.

Omerta is not a family value.

You can’t Make America Great Again by attacking American aspirations, core value, ideals and institutions.

You can’t protect women by taking away their rights.

You can’t stregthen our national defense by slandering officers serving our country.

You don't support law and Order if you condone police misconduct.

You’re not pro-life if you oppose government medical and nutritional assistance for infants and pregnant women.

In the wake of Iran-Contra and the January 6, 2021 coup attempt

• Party of Treason
• Donald Verbeck
• GOP Treason
• Lying "Fake News"
• Michael Braun, sung to Charlie Brown

In the wake of russian war crimes in Ukraine

• Butcher of Bucha
• Duma dork

Support your local police - but hold them accountable for misconduct.

• Citizens be adequately compensated for property damaged or lost due to search or seizure
• Citizens be adequately compensated for business continuity issues due to damge to or seizure of business records.
• Civil asset forfeiture be outlawed
• Congress curtail the qualified immunity dictrine
• Impounded evidence be securely stored and protected from damage or theft
• Impounded business records be expeditiously copied and returned
• Injured police be adequately cared for
• Police be adequately equipped
• Police be adequately monitored
• Police be adequately trained
• Police be held civilly and criminally liable for misconduct
• Survivors of deceased police be adequately cared for

Fight sexism

You can’t fight sexism by being sexist. You may be a sexist if you:

• Believe that certain jobs are effeminate
• Believe that certain jobs are unfeminine
• Believe that chores should be done based on sex rather than, e.g., availability, mutual decision, interest, skill
• Believe that it’s okay for a husband to beat his wife
• Believe that it’s okay for a wife to beat her husband
• Believe that only males should be allowed in combat.
• Believe that only males should be drafted.
• Believe that only males should pay alimony and child support
• Believe that stay at home moms are all gold diggers.
• Believe that there’s something wrong with a stay at home dad
• Believe that there’s something wrong with a working mom
• Defend prefering mothers over fathers in custudy disputes.
• Defend the Glass Ceiling.
• Judge people’s sexuality based on, e.g., their clothing, their hair
• Use any of the phrases
  • A woman’s place is in the home.
  • Children belong with their mothers.
  • Children, kitchen, church
  • It must be that time of month.
  • Men are more rational.
  • Raging hormones
  • Real men don’t cry.
  • She must have slept her way to the top.
  • She’ll quit as soon as she gets married.
  • Testosterone poisoning
  • Women are more empathic.
  • Women are too emotional.

Support our troops, not the brass.

Demand that Congress raise taxes to fund better care for veterans, low ranking personnel and their families.

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose:

• Tommy Atkins
• The Last of the Light Brigade

All lives matter - stop the slaughter!

If they bomb your ashram, my church isn’t safe.
If they bomb your church, my mosque isn’t safe.
If they bomb your mosque, my synagog isn’t safe.
If they bomb your synagog, my temple isn’t safe.
If they bomb your temple, my ashram isn’t safe.

I’m well aware that some countries, e.g., China, India, Iran, Pakistan, Russia, Turkey, have a much worser record than we do, but as a US citizen I am more aware of and more ashamed of the outrages at home.

The Henry A. Wallace Police Crime Database contains far more cases than I can list here, but some samples are:

• Adult lives matter

  • Ricky John Best
  • Stephen Dolceamore
  • Daoyou Feng
  • Micah David-Cole Fletcher
  • Hyun Jung Grant (née Kim)
  • Suncha Kim
  • Paul Andre Michels
  • Taliesin Myrddin Namkai-Meche
  • Soon Chung Park
  • Xiaojie Tan
  • Breonna Taylor
  • Michael Tyree
  • Daniel Vallee
  • Delaina Ashley Yaun
  • Yong Ae Yue
• Asian lives matter

  • Daoyou Feng
  • Hyun Jung Grant (née Kim)
  • Suncha Kim
  • Srinivas Kuchibhotla
  • Alok Madasani
  • Hiu Lui Ng
  • Soon Chung Park
  • Xiaojie Tan
  • Huy Chi Tran
  • Delaina Ashley Yaun
  • Yong Ae Yue
• Black lives matter

  • Javier Ambler
  • James Brissette
  • Michael Brown
  • Philando Castile
  • John Crawford III
  • Jordan Edwards
  • Manuel Ellis
  • George Floyd
  • Shaun Fuhr
  • Nathaniel Levi Gaines
  • Eric Garner
  • Henry "Peg" Gilbert
  • Henry Glover
  • Oscar Grant
  • Freddie Gray
  • Ronald Greene
  • Greg Gunn
  • Akai Gurley
  • Botham Jean
  • Kathryn Johnston
  • Robert Junior Langley
  • Julian Edward Roosevelt Lewis
  • Amir Locke
  • David McAtee
  • Laquan McDonald
  • Tommie Dale McGlothen Jr
  • Ronald Madison
  • Trayvon Martin
  • Salaythis Melvin
  • Lionel Morris
  • Daniel Prude
  • Darren Rainey
  • Michael Ramos
  • Michael Sabbie
  • Walter Scott
  • Jason Walker
  • Elliott Williams
  • Daunte Wright
  • Ousmane Zongo
• Children’s lives matter

  • Jordan Edwards
  • Felipe Gómez Alonzo
  • Jakelin Caal
  • Jeremy Mardis
  • Santos Rodriguez
  • Xiaojie Tan
  • Delaina Ashley Yaun
• Female lives matter

  • Holly Barlow-Austin
  • Hyun Jung Grant (née Kim)
  • Heather Heyer
  • Breonna Taylor
  • Xiaojie Tan, age 49
  • Delaina Ashley Yaun
• Jewish lives matter

  • Josef Neumann
  • Lori Gilbert-Kaye
  • Joyce Fienberg
  • Richard Gottfried
  • Rose Mallinger
  • Jerry Rabinowitz
  • Cecil, Rosenthal
  • David Rosenthal
  • Bernice Simon
  • Sylvan Simon
  • Melvin Wax
  • Irving Younger
• Latino lives matter

  • Felipe Gómez Alonzo
  • Santiago Baten-Oxlaj
  • Jakelin Caal
  • Nicholas Chavez
  • James Porter Garcia
  • Andres Guardado
  • Sergio Adrian Hernandez Guereca
  • Sergio Hernandez
  • Elcias Hernandez-Ortiz
  • Anastasio Hernández-Rojas
  • Carlos Ingram-Lopez
  • Mariee Juárez
  • Johana Medina Leon
  • Ramon Timothy Lopez
  • Carlos Ernesto Escobar Mejía
  • Sean Monterrosa
  • José Antonio Elena Rodríguez
  • Santos Rodriguez
  • José Soto
  • Antonio Valenzuela
• Moslem lives matter

  • Yusor Mohammad Abu-Salha
  • Deah Shaddy Barakat
  • Razan Mohammad Abu-Salha

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