So you think you can type?

No news today so thought I’d share some info instead.

Ever wonder how fast you can type?

Well here are a few easy ways to find out:

http://www.typingtest.com/

http://www.typeonline.co.uk/typingspeed.php?

http://games.aol.com/game/typer-shark/

A data entry fact:

Modern data processing began with the inventions of American engineer, Herman Hollerith.

Hollerith had left teaching and begun working for the United States Census Office in the year he filed his first patent application. Titled “Art of Compiling Statistics”, it was filed on September 23, 1884 and was granted on January 8, 1889.

Hollerith built machines under contract for the Census Office, which used them to tabulate the 1890 census in only one year. The 1880 census had taken eight years. Hollerith then started his own business in 1896, founding the Tabulating Machine Company. Most of the major census bureaus around the world leased his equipment and purchased his cards, as did major insurance companies. To make his system work, he invented the first automatic card-feed mechanism and the first key punch (i.e. a punch that was operated from a keyboard), which allowed a skilled operator to punch 200–300 cards per hour. He also invented a tabulator. The 1890 Tabulator was hardwired to operate only on 1890 Census cards. A wiring panel in his 1906 Type I Tabulator allowed it to do different jobs without having to be rebuilt (the first step towards programming).These inventions were the foundation of the modern information processing industry.

In 1911, four corporations, including Hollerith’s firm, merged to form the Computing Tabulating Recording Corporation (CTR). Under the presidency of Thomas J. Watson, it was renamed International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) in 1924.

Do you RGIS?

Ok so maybe that isn’t a great slogan… I had called in response to an ad in the paper last week. They told me that there was an open group interview Friday. I went and listened to the info, passed the test and filled out the forms they gave me. All of which took almost three hours to complete, mainly waiting for the other applicants to test.

First was a series of 40 diagrams depicting stacked shapes. You had to count how many “items” there were in each diagram, and manage to get at least a score of 21 in five minutes. Your score was how many you got right, minus how many you got wrong. I scored 40, I was also the only person in the room to finish the whole test in the time given. Although at least two others said they were on the next to last question.

Next they brought out their scanners, gave you six sheets of numbers to enter and after explaining which buttons to push let you practice before the second test. The second test was two billboards that depicted supermarket shelves. Your task was to inventory both in 9 minutes. You even got to practice before hand. After two hours I was quite ready to get it over with and didn’t take advantage of the fact that the practice billboards were the same was the test ones, so you could just enter all the numbers from memory.

Still I entered everything in 6 minutes and only missed one item. At this point they handed each person who completed and passed both tests an application and several forms to fill out. And believe it or not some people didn’t pass both tests. A few got frustrated by the scanners and just left, others couldn’t enter the right numbers no matter how hard they tried. One girl even failed and they let her practice again and retake the second test.

I wanted to mention two things that struck me as odd. First would be the tax forms, I don’t remember the form number but there was one that said “Write your date of birth if you are over 18 but under 40”. Now as you may or may not know, it’s against the law to ask a job applicant their age. You may have to require someone be over 18, and yes it’s not hard to find out since it’ll be in any background check run on that person. It just seemed like a sneaky way to pre-screen older workers out. I also found this form at Gordman’s, which as anyone who has been there knows is a very “young” store.

The second thing that bothered me was the fact that one girl was told in-front of the rest of us they’d call her tomorrow for training. The rest of us were told “we’ll contact you”. I don’t claim to understand the hiring process but if someone can’t even work the equipment, shows up late for the interview, and has to retake the test. Why prefer them over the rest?