Currently available topics for PhD and Master projects:
Feel free to propose other topics within my research interests.
Agile practices and artefacts
Application of Agile practices and use of the Agile artefacts should depend on the project's and company's needs, to improve communication within the project and as result the overall outcome. However, in real industrial projects, the choice might be also influenced by what the developers are used to use and by the limitations of their knowledge about the artefacts and practices. Cultural aspects (including both organisational and national culture) as well as increased shift to remote/hybrid work mode might also play a role in this choice.
This research will focus on (1) analysis of the aspects influencing the choice of Agile artefacts, and whether the project results might be improved by an extended decision support, (2) analysis of industrial perception of what Agile artefacts are especially useful and usable in remote settings.
Impact of Organisational Culture on the Requirement Engineering Activities
Requirement Engineering (RE) is a socio-technical activity and it demands intensive communication with the stake- holders to elicit and model all requirements. As both national and organisational cultures influence the behaviour of the individuals and their work practices, they might also influence RE activities deeply. This research will focus on elaboration of a formal framework for identifying and analysing cultural influences that could impact RE activities: the aim is to apply the framework not only on the national culture level, but expand it to the level of organisational culture to provide a more nuanced approach. The proposed framework will help RE practitioners to systematically analyse and determine a set of national and organisational cultural influences in several cultures and organisations.
Automated (AI-based) analysis of Agile artefacts
There are many approaches for automated marking of assessments, but they typically limited to questions that assume answers strictly fitting to a particular structure, e.g., some approached work well for checking programming code. However, when we need to provide quick feedback on artefacts like product/sprint backlogs, Trello boards, etc., the situation is more complex. This project is focused on elaboration of a framework for analysis and assessment Requirements Engineering (RE) and Project Management artefacts, as well as providing corresponding feedback to students with the references what exactly material student has to re-watch/re-read.
Analysis of the artefacts might require application some AI approaches, e.g., ML where the model will be trained with each additional check. It might also apply some RE techniques for analysis of completeness.
Game-based learning of formal reasoning
Software has an increasing impact on everyday life. Tasks such as navigation and banking heavily rely on software. A software error can lead to financial loss or even loss of human life, making correctness crucial for many safety-critical systems. This means it is increasingly important to be able to verify the correctness of software as it is developed [1]. This is usually done by the use of formal methods, in which the behavior of the software is modelled mathematically, allowing logical analysis of its properties. There have been some spectacular recent successes in this regard, such as the formal verification of a Linux kernel [2], which made heavy use of FMs.
This makes it vital for humans to understand formal models. Specifically we need to better understand how informal descriptions can be transformed into formal models, and how a software engineer can be sure that this transformation has been performed correctly. Put another way, how can we minimize and eliminate any mismatch between the intuitive (human) description and the formal (mathematical) specification of it? And can a game-based approach assist?
The aim of this project is to analyze possible solutions for this problem and to elaborate a game-based framework to assist in the understanding of difficulties in formalization. A potential solution is to combine real-world problems with puzzles based on famous stories and movies, or even magic tricks [3,4], thus making FMs and other aspects of STEM more appealing. This will enable uses to understand formal systems and their properties, and how solutions to formal problems can be solved automatically.
If you are interested in my supervision:
Make sure you meet the Entry Requirements for DR221 PhD (Computer Science) program at RMIT.
Especially note that to be eligible for PhD study at RMIT you should:
Have the required research component in your study (Master or Honours Bachelor),
Your GPA should be above 70%,
You should meet the English requirements.
However:
If you have publications at top-ranked conferences or in top-ranked journals, this can be considered as alternative for research component.
If your GPA is below 70% but above 60%, you might be eligible to enrol in the for Master by Research study with a possibility to transfer later to PhD in the case you have very good results within the first year of Master by Research study.
Check my areas of research through my publications and find a common interest. If you cannot find a common interest, you need to look for some other supervisors who work on the topics you are interested in. If you have issues to access full text of any of my papers, simply request a private copy via ResearchGate.
Contact me by sending me the following information via email:
The research area that you would like to pursue a PhD under my supervision (e.g., requirements engineering, testing, formal methods, etc.).
GPA of your highest degree (please also send me a copy of your academic transcripts).
If you have publications already, send me the one you consider to be your best, including the venue it was published in.
A title and a brief description of a problem/project you would like to work on. I also provide a number of "ready" topics (see them below). If you are interested in any of these, check the topic in depth, explain what exactly and how you would like to do within this project.
Your funding situation:
If you are an international student looking for an RMIT scholarship (either full scholarship or to cover only tuition fees): RMIT scholarships for international applicants are unfortunately extremely limited and difficult to obtain. To have some chances, you need to have both (1) top grades, i.e., GPA 85-100%, and (2) publications in A/A*-ranked conferences or Q1/Q2 ranked journals. If your grades are not so high, I suggest you to look for a scholarship from your home country or consider a self-funded option (and work part-time while studying full-time), as application for an RMIT scholarship would make no sense in this case. If your grades are really very high, but you don't have any publications in top-venues yet, we can discuss your case.
When we have project funding for scholarships, we advertise them explicitly. Note, that if we propose project scholarships, this is also a competitive process, where top grades and publications in top-ranked conferences and journals are the core criteria (local students have preference in this process).