About Me
Hello! I'm Shashiwadana Nirmani
I am a PhD researcher in Software Engineering at Deakin University, Australia, with research interests in open source software (OSS) ecosystems, empirical software engineering , and human-centered software engineering. My research explores how human factors influence participation in OSS projects. By integrating behavioural and social factors into OSS project recommendation systems, I aim to develop more personalized, human-aware approaches that better support software practitioners than traditional recommendation techniques based solely on technical characteristics.
Prior to commencing my PhD, I worked as a Software Engineer, gaining over two years of industry experience developing software solutions in Agile environments.
Alongside my research, I work as a Graduate Researcher Teaching Fellow at Deakin University. I enjoy supporting student learning, sharing practical software engineering knowledge, and contributing to the academic community through both teaching and research.
Education
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Deakin University, Australia · School of Information Technology
Supervisors: Dr. Hourieh Khalajzadeh, Prof. Xiao Liu, and Dr. Mojtaba Shahin
Thesis: Recommending Open Source Software Projects Based on Contributors' Motivations and Team Dynamics. Developing a human-centered recommendation system that matches contributors with open source software projects by integrating their motivations and team dynamics alongside technical factors.
BSc (Hons) in Information Technology
University of Moratuwa, Sri Lanka · Faculty of Information Technology
- Graduated with First Class Honours.
- Dean's List Honours for Semester 7 with a GPA of 4.03/4.2.
- Dean's List Honours for Semester 8 with a GPA of 3.90/4.2.
Experience
Graduate Researcher Teaching Fellow
Deakin University, Australia
- Conducted active learning on-campus sessions and online tutorials for undergraduate students.
- Assessed assignments and examinations in written, presentation-based, and video-based submissions.
- Units:
- SIT 217 - Introduction to Software Engineering (Trimester 2 - 2024, Trimester 2 - 2025, Trimester 2 - 2026)
- SIT 102 - Introduction to Programming (Trimester 1 - 2026)
- SIT 328 - Communicating Information Technology Projects (Trimester 1 - 2025)
Research Assistant
Deakin University, Australia
- Conducted large-scale analysis of 7 million+ Google Play app reviews to investigate age-related user concerns and age-inclusive mobile application design.
- Co-Developed machine learning, deep learning, and large language model (LLM) approaches to automatically detect age-related discussions in app reviews.
- Conducted qualitative thematic analysis and contributed to research findings published in the Journal of Systems and Software. [DOI]
Software Engineer
Ascentic, Sri Lanka
- Developed cross-platform mobile applications using Flutter, delivering high-quality solutions for both Android and iOS platforms.
- Served as the scrum master, facilitating sprint planning, daily stand-ups, and retrospectives while ensuring effective Agile team collaboration.
- Contributed to mobile healthcare applications for Scandinavian clients, collaborating with an international development team across Sri Lanka and Sweden.
Publications
2026:
- Nirmani, S., Sharma, G., Khalajzadeh, H. and Shahin, M., 2026. Age Matters: Analyzing Age-Related Discussions in App Reviews. Journal of Systems and Software, p.112800. [DOI]
- Nirmani, S., Khalajzadeh, H., Shahin, M. and Liu, X., 2026. Beyond Code: Empirical Insights into How Team Dynamics Influence OSS Project Selection. [DOI]
2025:
- Nirmani, S., Shahin, M., Khalajzadeh, H. and Liu, X., 2025. A Systematic Literature Review on Task Recommendation Systems for Crowdsourced Software Engineering. Information and Software Technology, 184, p.107753. [DOI]
2023:
- Nirmani, S., and Ranathunga, L., 2023, February. Article Elements Recognition of Old Sinhala Newspapers Using Vision Heuristic Algorithm. In 2023 3rd International Conference on Advanced Research in Computing (ICARC) (pp. 108-113). IEEE. [DOI]
2021:
- Gayashan, P.P.A., Perera, K.A.V.G., Nirmani, S., and Ranathunga, L., 2021, December. Old Sinhala Newspaper Article Segmentation for Content Recognition Using Image Processing. In 2021 From Innovation To Impact (FITI) (Vol. 1, pp. 1-6). IEEE. [DOI]
Awards & Scolarships
Academic Awards & Recognitions
- ACM Distinguished Paper Award Nominee
- Nominated for the ACM Distinguished Paper Award at the 19th International Conference on Cooperative and Human Aspects of Software Engineering (CHASE 2026), for the paper: “Beyond Code: Empirical Insights into How Team Dynamics Influence OSS Project Selection”.
- Emerging Research Spotlight – OzSE 2026
- Delivered a spotlight talk at the Australian Summer School in Software Engineering (OzSE 2026), titled “Motivations Matter: Personalizing Open Source Project Recommendations”.
- Top 3 Poster Award – CS3 Symposium 2025
- Recognised among the Top 3 posters at the CS3 Symposium, organised by the Centre for Software, Systems and Society, Deakin University, for a poster on doctoral research.
Scholarships
- Deakin University Post Graduate Research Scholarship
- Fully funded scholarship awarded by Deakin University for doctoral research (2023-2026).
Beyond Research
I enjoy swimming and landscape photography.
