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Autism Traits Prove Valuable for Software Testing
Back in 2009 we ran a story about a Chicago based non-profit company that trained high-functioning autistic people to be software testers. Two years later Aspiritech has grown to offer services in Belgium, Japan and Israel. Autistic debuggers are used by large clients like Oracle and Microsoft and have proven to be so good in fact that companies are now recruiting to meet demand. From the article: "Aspiritech's board of directors includes social service providers, therapists, a vocational expert and a software engineer. The nonprofit also received start-up advice and consultation from Keita Suzuki, who has co-founded a similar company, called Kaien, in Japan. Aspiritech has hired and trained seven recruits with Asperger's syndrome. These recruits have since worked on software-testing projects for smartphone and cloud-computing applications. Aspiritech now offers functional-, compatibility- and regression-testing, as well as test-case development, with experience in cloud-computing platforms including Salesforce."
Is just recruit people who bought minecraft. It's really part of the same population set, but these one's are already used to using computers for 10 hours a day doing the same repetitive thing over and over.
Not to mention for con artists scamming gullible parents of children with autism into believing widely used vaccines caused their kids' disorder, rather than the genes they pass on to said children.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
do well at software testing. That's really the story here. Autism is irreverent. This very idea is based upon a lot of wrong information about people with Autism.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Now out side debuggers / testers do have there up's and downs but at times having ones that are in the same place as the people doing the coding is better with less trun around time.
Now I hope that they are being payed for the long hours with full over time pay.
I have asperger.. I'm glad that there's more & more peeps who see that its not a disability; but rather a unique way of looking at the world.
Its really not the same worldpicture you 'normals' see... I can really get upset if i see 'wrongs' in this world. Just as i feel in a way that it's the same as seeing 'wrongs' in software or hardware. I wont be able to put it behind me; or just to buy something to make me feel good... Or just accept that my boss says its the rigth thing; or that there's no money or something 'reasonable' like that.
You talk about training.. Its not training; its in the core being who you are. Are you dedicated enough to spend ALL your energy (&that's the same amount of energy that you have) in trying to get the job done.. to find ALL the things that are wrong with something? (& not be at home spending time on your cat/girl/man/car/career/whatever).
Peeps who have the same as i have, generally can focus ALL of their attention to the project they are dedicated to. Totally emerce yourself in a project; even if it takes longer than you think; even if it means skipping a few days of sleep..
I'm sure you are a dedicated individual; that has the ability to do his/her job right.. But i generally don't see the (not negatively meant) singlemindedness/focus i can put in something that interest me.
I can see that there are cases that let Asperger's syndrome be an advantage (the same way as i have seen it being a disadvantage in my life sometimes) when checking out something.
Too bad you dismiss it as irrelevant. Maybe someday in the future you will understand the pro's and cons of someone with asperger.
I'm glad my current employer understands... I do know she's happy that i'm there; even though i sometimes do things 'normals' dont expect, or do. & sometimes i cost more of her energy..
I also know that i've saved the company a lot of resources just because i happen to think 'out of the box' & do things my way; not the way peeps expect you to be/perform.
Maybe it's over-self-diagnosed, but there's a proper clinical diagnosis, and it's a serious condition. The person with Asperger's does have significant strengths, though, and they tend to align with technology skills, so there's no real surprise here to those who know about Aperger's.
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Asperger's is a mild form of autism. One of it's characteristics is that the people who have it focus very intently on what they're doing for extended periods of time. As a result, they make excellent programmers and testers because they'll put in hours without even realizing the time has gone by.
In a sense, Asperger's is almost the reverse of ADD.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
Aspergers typically even has a distinctive gait, so it isn't as easy to claim as some non-specific "borderline autism" claim that is more likely bogus.
And in their defense, they're still dorks either way.
The most over-self-diagnosed conditions on the planet, thanks to the perceived ability to explain social awkwardness and claim a special area of brilliance.
That, and taking Aspergers frees up stat points for you to allocate elsewhere.
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Maybe it's just me, but this reminds me of focus from Vinge's A Deepness in the Sky.
It gripped her hand gently. 'Regret is for humans,' it said.
Condition? I (and a lot of leading Asperger's advocates) think it's more a type of brain than a condition. I was in the waiting room one day while my son was in an Asperger's class, and noticed that three of us dads were discussing the nature of human consciousness. Not your standard dad discussion. Point being, we're a breed apart from the 'regular' dads.
The determined Real Programmer can write Fortran programs in any language.
A different type of brain would certainly be a condition of sorts.
Now, I don't like such absolutes as "never", because they're so... absolute. It's fully possible to, while following the scientific method perfectly, prove a hypothesis correct. It just takes a very particular kind of hypothesis, and a very particular kind of experiment.
As an example, consider the hypothesis that of Foo, Bar, and Baz, Foo is the most quiggle. This hypothesis can indeed be proven correct, but only by testing every possibility, which of course results in proving other hypotheses wrong.
As for the fields of pharmacology and medical science, your complaint of worthless research seems to be based on the assumption that only perfect knowledge is worthwhile. Quite the contrary, actually: Medical treatments can be effective even if we don't know why. The pain-relieving quality of willow bark was known 2300 years before its pharmacological mechanism was understood. Research into new treatments is very valuable, even without full understanding of the mechanisms involved. Of course such knowledge is preferred, but that's another several years of research after the initial findings.
The only "huge issue" I see with pharmacology and medical science is that they're so intently watched by the media and "science fans" for any sign of a coming miracle cure, in the constant hunt for headlines. Any finding of anything affecting any kind of cancer cells is reported as a "potential cure". In the actual research paper, the findings are almost always stated exactly as they should be: some indications, little concrete evidence, and suggestions for further avenues of research. Other sciences are picking up this attention, as well, but still usually maintain their integrity. Electrical engineering hits the news whenever some transparent, tiny, or shiny prototype finally works. Psychologists are asked for comment when there's a serial killer running amok. Sociology has its fifteen minutes of fame when there's some new theory to explain 4chan. Disease is just constantly affecting millions of people, so it's always interesting news.
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.