 My name is Richard and I'm an intermediate Linux user, diagnosed with ADHD and Aspergers. On a daily basis I use Linux for Java programming and productivity and gaming. I'm also a trained teacher, male, 39 years of age living in Sweden. I first started using Linux in the late 90s. In this seminar I will describe the conditions Aspergers, ADHD and dyslexia. I will also talk about how to include neurodiverse people in open source and Fedora. I use accessibility software due to being diagnosed with Aspergers and ADHD. I mostly use speech synthesis to find spelling errors and calendar software with accommodations. I will talk a little bit about my somewhat involvement with Fedora. I use Fedora Workstation 3.5 on this computer. It's an i7, an older i7. I joined Fedora because of the inclusive environment and also due to the fact that there were also other neurodiverse people in the Fedora community. When I have time I like to participate in the Fedora diversity and accessibility groups. I'm also very happy that Fedora has recently made a commitment to being an accessible Linux distribution. I mainly use Fedora Workstation as a desktop OS. In the future I may try out Fedora servers but I like though that there are basic and easy setup guides for things such as doing active directory or LDAP server on the Fedora Workstation site. Now I will talk about ADHD. ADHD has these core symptoms. Attention can be shown through difficulties of concentration, forgetfulness and distractibility. Many are easily bored and fail to complete things which fall out of their areas of interest. Impulsivity can be shown through strong and emotional reactions to different things. Difficulty listening to others and difficulties in handling unstructured situations which require reflection and thinking things through. In some people impulsivity may lead to difficulties in motor control. Hyperactivity, this is the point about difficulty in regulating the activity level according to what is done. So it's neither too low or too high. Difficulties in sitting still and winding down can be mixed with periods of exhaustion. And sometimes hyperactivity in children is often physical while in adults it's more of an internal restlessness with sometimes causing sleeping problems amongst other things. Some people can have all of these three core symptoms and ours might have only two or one of these. And you can read more about ADHD in Wikipedia for example. I will now talk about Aspergers. Aspergers is a form of autism without intellectual disability. According to newer manuals it's also referred to as autism level one. Difficulties in social contact with other people, special areas of interest which may consume a large part of an individual's attention and time. Difficulties understanding and using language and communication with others, deficits in motor skills. The individual might easily get caught up in certain routines or actions, unusual perceptions and sensitivity to different things such as sound light and so on. Now I will talk a little bit about dyslexia. Dyslexia is probably the condition I will cover least because I have met one or two people with dyslexia but I'm certainly not an expert in this condition. Anyhow it's common that people with neurodiverse or neuropsychiatric conditions might also have difficulties reading and writing. Sometimes these problems might also depend upon difficulties in attendance, hyperactivity and impulsivity. However the cause might also be dyslexia. People with dyslexia have difficulty recognizing and understanding words. Some common symptoms are that they might place letters in words in the incorrect order and making reading comprehension is more difficult. I can recommend that once in the medical library of the University of Gothenburg I find a really good book on dyslexia. So you can find really good books if you want to know more about dyslexia but anyway I won't cover it in detail because I'm not an expert. Dyslexia isn't correlated with intelligence. Dyslexia can't always be cured but accommodations might help a great deal in school and the job market. Reading a lot and listening to audiobooks can lead to improvements in the ability to read the right of persons with dyslexia. Now I will talk about dyscalculia. It's a term for difficulty with basic math skills such as adding and subtracting numbers. I've met a student with these and when we colored the X's and Y's and so on in equations it seemed to be easier to recognize the math problems. Now I will talk about the strengths of ADHD. Ability to find solutions to difficult problems, able to talk about many different topics at one time. Good in crisis, some of the most stressful jobs are staffed by those with ADHD, empathic and intuitive and entrepreneurial. I would say that especially from a English speaking content context I would say that entrepreneurialism and ADHD is very... It's thought of as a very good thing because sometimes in English speaking cultures being an entrepreneur it's not that it's bad to be an entrepreneur in Sweden but sometimes English speaking cultures that embrace the individual, for example, Virgin Records, Richard Branson has ADHD and so on. In English speaking countries even more this thing with an entrepreneurial streak is lifted. Now I will talk a little bit about the strengths of Aspergers. High concentration and precision in work, attention to minute details, patience for repetitive tasks, higher memory power, hardworking and loyal. Now I will talk a little bit about the strengths of dyslexia. Yet again I'm not an expert in this but it seems as though dyslexic people might have some of them when it comes to strengths. They are better at remembering stories like both sounds and pictures and so on rather than remembering text as a random list of data or a list of like C code include S standard input, output dot H or something like that and that may help them in perhaps acting or writing where it's very important to remember a script with images and so on. Excellent possible skills, brilliant spatial reasoning, spatial reasoning has to do with how you organize things in a room and so on. Great conversationalists and tremendous empathizers. Now I will talk a little bit about the strengths of this Calculia and this is difficult perhaps to especially for me as a person that likes numbers too. Of course I've met a person who had this like one or two but it can be difficult to imagine how it is to live without numbers but of course all people with dyslexia does not have perceptions of numbers so it will be different than different people. But anyway, creativity, strategic thinking, practical ability, problem solving, love of words, they can be better at words than numbers and intuitive thinking. It's an ongoing debate whether this Calculia is correlated with intelligence or not but generally it's not considered with general intelligence but it's a complex discussion. Now I will talk a little bit about neurodiversity. It's a term for understanding conditions such as these such as Asperger's dyslexia ADHD, this Calculia and so on as natural variations in the human gene pool rather than only pathological conditions. At all people are different yet other neurodiverse people in the Fedora project may have some things in common like trouble focusing or keeping time or whatever. Now I will talk a little bit about my personal neurodiverse strengths. My weaknesses are especially web programming and programming user interfaces why I often use NetBeans or let's see there's KDevelop I will try when learning C++ to perhaps do user interfaces in C++ and once I hit the wall when I had an internship in web development which I stopped after that. And also thinking about accessibility from neurodiversity standpoints and hardware electronics like I would be able to tell you off the top of my head that the program counter is registered that points to the next instruction that the processor is supposed to execute or that for example the registered AX and BX in an Intel X66 processor can contain that data and then you add them to together and the data and the result of the addition will end up in the third register. I will talk a little bit about my personal thoughts on interaction design from a neurodiversity standpoint so I might be impatient sometimes so I need to have progress bars to ensure processes haven't failed if they take some time. If I were to encounter simple things simple pictures on like Arduino and electronics and computing on the site directed towards people with Aspergers and ADHD I would lose interest because I would that that site was not directed towards college educated people with Aspergers which is the target group I belong to that have taken computer. On the other hand I might appreciate simple pictures on sites directed towards people with autism or Aspergers on how to manage things in your home or how to get the washing machine started I or in the in the room I always think about where is the. And sometimes I Google I manage it eventually but sometimes I like simple. And for example if I order something in an online store it's very important that the system clearly indicates that now we're processing your payment this will take a few minutes please wait and seeing a progress bar and also when it comes to Linux commands like. Secure remove I'm a privacy minded computer user and but I think it's you can when you use secure move use a verbose option so that it's telling you how many wipes it has done so so that so that is something I like. And men and women with these conditions will most likely describe their struggle strengths and weaknesses in different ways due to the different expectations placed on men and women I want to go to in depth on that but that is something I have observed and that I feel that it's. Now I will talk a little bit about how to include nor diverse people for example in the fedora project or in red hat. So. Unfortunately this slide is not so good but I will read I will read what it says not not all nor diverse people are top programmers. And it's important to realize for example once I looked at the company called SAP I will talk a little bit more about the net that had a new diversity. Hiring initiative but you were able you had to do a month of tests and only the best people would get a job. This is getting a little bit better now now that IT companies more of them are recruiting nor diverse talent but that is something. And I'm a decent programmer and I'm very happy to teach new employees that have done Python to do basic CNC plus those in Linux but I'm not a top programmer. And but on the other hand some nor diverse people may be top programs. So let's think about it in other ways. What what can not nor diverse people do it for example fedora. Some nor diverse people are great artists. They may be good at for example painting the wallpaper the wallpapers or doing user interfaces. Event organizers some people with ADHD only or ADHD. It may be very outgoing and like to organize events and perhaps go around talking to everyone or greeting people in the door or handing out promotions for an event. For example for a physical event. Some nor diverse people that are outgoing may or they can also have only as per my main like to help people with the teaching or in the support they can perhaps do. REL H support for example. And some some nor diverse people with as per this for example may have very strong language skills and thus may be very good at translating for example for Dora. Or or HEL to different languages. So these are things to consider when when you want to recruit nor diverse talent and also to think about what kind of nor diverse talent do we wish to recruit. Now I will talk a little bit about nor diversity recruitment which is also a growing trend in especially English speaking. And it may not always follow the same process or pattern as recruiting neurotypical people. I will I will talk a little bit about I covered the company SAP. It's probably more known in the European market. I think it has a base in Germany. It has to do with business software. They do lots of business software that especially large European companies use. Microsoft is probably familiar to everyone. They have like nor diversity hiring initiatives. Some Microsoft people that have autism talk at conferences about this recently IBM. I don't know if they have a special nor diversity hire initiative but I believe they have interest groups for nor diverse people. And then one company which is probably very familiar to to many people though that you might not always think of it as an I company MasterCard. I saw recently launched launched a new diversity hiring initiative which I saw on LinkedIn. So now I will talk a little bit more about the practical process of of doing interviews and tests. So some nor diverse people may all not always fare well on standardized recruitment tests on personality and standardized achievements and intelligence tests. And this is also true for me that I do a lot better when I did my evaluation you get shown lots of pictures. Where does the next picture come in and so on if Lisa is having tea with someone. I don't do very well in those and I don't do very well in standardized achievements and intelligence tests. But if you ask me to do a question or a lecture on C++ I do fairly well and I do fairly well in real social situations like presenting at this conference. And I can also talk a bit about for example I once applied for a job in an IT company where I had the best result. I won't mention their name but anyway I was before I was diagnosed but I moved on from that. But I had the best test results of everyone. It was an IT support job and it was a little bit strange that you had to work an entire day to see who's the best candidate by Swedish measures not strange by American message. But apparently I wasn't good enough with solving riddles so I didn't get the chance at that company. I won't mention the name but that can be one example. So get to know neurodiverse people in situations where they feel comfortable. So if you want to look at yet again all neurodiverse people are different. Not all neurodiverse people might interact well in a group. But if you want to see some of their ability to interact with our people it's better if you do it in a situation. If they are comfortable ask them to do a simulated support call or in my case ask me to do a presentation on C or C++. Because that is one area where I really shine. And sometimes it's even more common in USA like companies in Google things like that you have to solve problems. And I won't say that it's a bad thing. It's not as common in Sweden though we get lots of American recruitment trends. So it will probably be more common in the future. And it must not apply to all neurodiverse people. But I rather saw programming problems back at problems in Java and C++ rather than Python. This is not true for other people but it can be a good way to ask the candidate. If you're supposed to solve a programming problem during a job interview. What languages are you more comfortable with? Now I will talk a little bit about the ethics of diversity and inclusion. Like four or five minutes. So this is a question which requires a lot of thought. So the first question will be why at this company or organization do we include people who are neurodiverse than disabled? Do we include them because we must fulfill some government requirement? Do we include them to show that we're an ethical company due to our social responsibility documents for example? Do we include neurodiverse people and people who have disabilities because we wish to improve upon the situations of these people in society? Do we include disabled people because we follow some kind of ethical code of religion such as Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism or other religion which talks about the importance of helping people that have difficulties? And personally I would see that all of these have a relevance because it will help neurodiverse people get a job. But of course in an ideal world which the world is often not, it would only be to the good of their heart. So if I would talk to different organizations when it comes to why they should include neurodiverse people, I would push on different things like a council for example, I'm not sure it's a council in USA but in Britain it's called a council. And a council might, they often have HR policies saying we're an open opportunity, we're an equal opportunity employer, we welcome everyone with a disability. Sometimes it may be true, otherwise it may be true to some degree but if I would work with an organization ruled by policy I would most definitely put an emphasis on their policy documents. For example, if I would work with a large US company that for example does contracting with the government like an IT company or a company like Boeing or something, I would stress on them that if you show that you fulfill legal requirements like ADA and include disabled people, sometimes it might be an advantage when negotiating governmental contract and so on. And if I would talk to an IT company or like a regular company, perhaps I would press on that including neurodiverse people make a better job environment or neurodiverse companies might be more profitable, there's a neurodiversity index and so on. And from what I know in Europe and America it's common for Christian businesses or politicians to include disabled people in some way due to their religion and I personally don't see this as a bad thing. When it comes to my knowledge of disability inclusion and other religions it's highly limited. But I know that Islam talks about caring for people that are not well in a good way so it might also be true that companies in the Arab world but my knowledge of that is limited so I will leave that out for now. But as you see all of these are questions which requires a lot of thought and personally from my perspective diversity process is a process which I've learned largely by practical experience. And I would also say that it's not good to absolutely push a person forcing them to be a part of the diversity group if they not really want to of course there might be a sexual harassment or diversity harassment seminar if someone has said something that's not very good that you have to take in order to meet company policy that's one thing. But it will not be good if you have a diversity group with more diverse people and someone that has been pushed into that group due to some reason it will not be good for anyone. So that is my point that it's not good to push regular people into diversity if it's not a must. It's better if some perhaps you must force people but it's better if they volunteer. And I know also it's another thing to think about do men and women involved in diversity and inclusion projects focus on different aspects of these projects and to that question my answer would be most probably yes. I sometimes think about how to not to drop my airsoft gun when target shooting. Sometimes women may think about more about doing home software and I think it's often about doing technical modifications to software for cars to make it more easier and not to say that men and women can't do these things but it would be general. And now I talk a little bit about policy for reference sake. I'm a grassroot labor and the labor party has long been a power in Swedish politics but to not only get caught on on the left. Sometimes as a private citizen I talk to Christian democratic politicians on disabilities as issues as a private citizen and I can imagine that the Republicans. I know that Sarah Palin was a little bit criticized as governor but she has a nor diverse child so I can imagine that Republicans also do nor diversity initiatives. And I would say that to reach success in Swedish politics and strongly advocating for new diverse people it's not very easy to be a successful nor diverse Swedish politicians. There's a teacher called Alexander Schütte who's also left-wing politician in another party and he's number 19 on the list for the parliament and obviously I'm not. So anyway for me personally but since it gets again since all nor diverse people are different perhaps Sweden is a good country for some nor diverse people and perhaps for others not like me not. Anyway not everything is bad about Sweden but anyway for my personal perspective I would feel that English speaking countries are more embracing of nor diversity and thus I tend to do talks on nor diversity in English. Nordic countries has a very long way to go when it comes to nor diversity though some things are slowly getting better such as the fact that you're now able for example to join the Swedish defense force if you only have like the ADHD that was not possible before. And more companies are in Nordic countries are realizing the importance of nor diversity but I would still say that Nordic countries are at least five years behind when it comes to nor diversity. And of course there are also other nor diverse people from the Nordics doing countries speech such as this in English of course. When it comes to compare and culture I would say that a system where cottage dollars are tuition free and where you get many chances to retake an exam without being expelled that can happen in the US. I would say that it may benefit nor diverse people. So that is one good thing about the Nordic countries that you can retake an exam many times without being expelled. Of course you may not get the top job but you might need accommodation anyhow if you're not a nor diverse person. So sometimes it happens that top level politicians listens to me and of course when it happens when it happens it makes me very happy. And I would say generally that younger people within politics are also better at including nor diverse people. And if you make inspiration I won't name all Christian Democrats but I will never mention two names though Pia Stanislav and David Lega. Pia Stanislav is a responsible of disability questions for the Christian Democrats and David Lega is a member of the European Parliament and he deals a lot with disability issues. And David Lega is an aspiring person because he has limited mobility and seeks to make the most of lives and he does lectures on this. And he also used to compete as a swisher swimmer in Special Olympics and you can find his talks in both Swedish and English on living with a disability making the most of life. So that is something that can be an inspiration to other people. Now I will talk like one or two minutes about how to include people with other disabilities and open source and then I will open for questions or what I was so like the website of a few companies that have nor diversity higher initiatives but I have a friend called Mohammed who also used to be a laborer. He has a hearing disability and he taught me a lot about how you can include hearing disabled people in different contexts. For example he was a member of a gaming club for deaf people called Spellis. You can read more about them at www.spellis.news.com and they for example organized lawn parties for hearing disabled people. And for example if you make an open source game Mohammed also often makes videos in Facebook communicating in sign language. Unfortunately I don't know sign language but including people that communicating sign language in an open sourcing game might be easier. It makes it easier for hearing disabled people to follow the story of the game. And sometimes if you look at Barbie for example now they have Barbie dolls sitting in a wheelchair. I used to do an internship at a place called Funkebato which works a lot on improving life for people for example with mobility issues. And of course there is a commercial side to these things. But for example if you have a person with limited mobility like a wheelchair in an open source game that can be a way to change perceptions of people. So now I will ask about do you have any questions? Okay I will take like five minutes or something like that. I hope that the screen sharing works and I will show like one or two sites on neurodiversity and then I will end my talk. But we'll see if the screen sharing works. Let's see. I will probably let me go a little bit on LinkedIn for five minutes and then I will end my talk. I'll just log on to LinkedIn and I will show you very shortly what neurodiversity might look like. Because LinkedIn is probably the recruitment site in the English speaking world that has a lot to do with neurodiversity. So I will just show that for a few minutes and then I will end the talk. I will end the talk now but thanks for listening and if you have any questions you can always reach me at my email. Oh okay it's a question. Well it depends. That's a good question Luna. It depends. Sometimes it's marketing and recruiters on LinkedIn of course. But sometimes it's also people who try to make a difference. So it depends. But good good. Okay thanks everyone for listening and thanks for letting me speak. Unfortunately LinkedIn didn't work but at least the screen sharing works. So thanks a lot for everyone for listening. Bye bye.