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Xabbu
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28 May 2010, 8:23 am

I worked as a computer support tech for 10 years but got fired. I was replaced with a fresh-new younger man who just finished his bachelor. He was 50% cheaper than me and didn't had aspergers. I was fed up with being a support guy anyway. It made good money but the same stupid questions over and over again where not that interesting. I'm a bachelor in library sciences but IT is my thing I think. I also want to create something so I thought I would give development a try. Web development is my main interest so I subscribed to a 10 month training to become a PHP-developer. Learned CSS and some Javascript already and I'll be starting the education soon.
Is there anyone with experience in that job? What are the pro and cons for an asperger?



psychohist
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29 May 2010, 4:01 pm

I'm a software engineer, and most of my experience for the past decade has been in web development.

Software engineering in general is an excellent field for aspies. We get to work more with unemotional computers than with unpredictable humans. Whether something actually works tends to be important, so actual performance can outweigh buttering up the boss. These things are all favorable to aspies.

That said, web development is not the most aspie friendly part of software engineering. Web development tends to be done in teams, where interpersonal skills can be important, and while aspies can interact with each other pretty well on such a team, interacting with neurotypicals can be difficult. In addition, the technology changes in web development are rapid and sometimes faddish; this can be trying for an aspie who prefers to stick with things that work.

Still, I don't think it's a bad choice. I would recommend buying books and reading them as well as taking courses. The O'Reilly books tend to have good reference sections.



chrisk
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29 May 2010, 11:39 pm

I am a PHP dev as well, and for me, writing in code is my way of escaping this world. There are a ton of php jobs for freelancers/contract workers like me that pay very well ( the ones I saw paid ~$5000 at most).

The only part about website development that I sometimes struggle with is the team work. I can work with teams just fine, but when I am under stress, I my communication becomes inefficient and I sometimes forget to include certain details during our meetings, or ill misunderstand something that is in clear english, or ill have a question or feel like I should add something in, yet I never will because I just dont have the confidence (i guess you could say) to say what needs to be said. I am uncertain if that is normal for all aspies under stress, or if that is just me.

But still, I find computer software development quite fun at times because it allows me to be creative and create awesome applications.



Robdemanc
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01 Jun 2010, 6:04 am

Software development is perfect for an aspie. I have worked in it for over 10 years. I have done a range of roles too. The more difficult one was as a business analyst because that requires people skills the most. But when I was a pure programmer I loved it and they loved me because I was focused so much on solving the problems and developing code that worked. I think web developer will be fine. And as for team work, it may not be so hard because you will all be discussing development work and helping each other out with code and design issues.



Xabbu
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03 Jun 2010, 1:57 am

Thanks for the answers. I was not aware that web-development was more teamwork than general software development. Though I think I need to look at my general interest: providing information, internet as knowledge medium and I am fascinated by web applications and the possibility to provide applications that completely runs in a browser without installation and configuration on a clients machine.
I really like O'reilly books I also have Apress. I had a call to the education center and they said I could likely start at the end of this month! After 8 months sitting home unemployed, that really is a relief. The education is paid by the governement.

I'm also thinking what is the best way to work; a regular job where I'm paid each month, as a freelancer, interim, start a business of my own after a while... I would like to work freelance but isn't that difficult as an aspie? My main advantage would be that I could take a unpaid break between assignments to reset myself.



Jael
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05 Jun 2010, 2:22 pm

I spent five years as a software developer (including web development). I was good at it and loved it (and I still work in IT). I didn't encounter much team work, so that wasn't an issue (perhaps because I was responsible for creating all the layers of my applications - the database, the business logic, and the presentation layer). Even today I will put together an application every now and then and I still really enjoy it.