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HINA B. SHAH

Ph.D. Student @ Georgia Tech

Klaus Advanced Computing
266 Ferst Drive
Atlanta, GA 30332-0765
hinashah_at_cc_dot_gatech_dot_edu

 

 

ABOUT ME

I am a third year Ph.D student at Georgia Tech working as a graduate research assistant with advisor Mary Jean Harrold in the Aristotle Research Group. I did my undergrad in Information Technology from Thadomal Shahani Engineering College, India, and then Master's in Software Engineering from Birla Institute of Technology and Science, India.My research interest include exploring the human aspects of software engineering by primarily focussing on problems that software engineer face in the software development process. I am interested in understanding different aspects of the problems including the pyschological, social, and organizational aspects and finding solutions to these problems. I am using ethnography as a tool for understanding some of these problems. I hope to find solutions that are practical for deployment in the industry. I have been exploring domains such as Software Visualizations, User Interfaces and related areas for the solutions.

Over the summer of 2008, I was interning at IBM T. J. Watson Research Center in Hawthorne, NY. I was a part of Social Computing Group and was working on the Longitude Timeline Visualization project with Robert Farrel, Thomas Erickson, and Wendy Kellogg.


Course Projects
Project Title Description
image6 Using Visualization For Debugging Faults In Recursive Functions In this project the focus is on developing a way to visualize dynamic execution of recursive functions in the programs. The visualization is developed with an aim to help the programmers in understanding the execution of recursions and also to assist in evaluating the computation of the output. Thus the visualization, which is developed with an aim to visualize every round of the recursion being executed in the program and which displays useful state information, can be used by the developers for debugging faults in their recursive functions.
image2 Supporting Parent-Child Communication in Distributed Families The primary focus of this project was to provide support for distributed families (e.g., divorced parents) by developing a technology that could help parents and children connect when they are apart. To do so, we conducted online interviews with "virtual visitation" experts and ran a study to evaluate an interface we built by asking parents and their children to complete common-place tasks using our communication system.
image3 Semantic Zooming into Code One of the existing challenges in the domain of software engineering
is comprehending large programs quickly. In this project I developed a program visualization technique to make code viewing and program comprehension tasks simpler. To demonstrate the technique, I developed a prototype interface that facilitates viewing of the structural (e.g., packages, sub-packages, classes within packages) and contextual (code in this case) details of a software project
simultaneously. The interface also provides with a facility to drill down to complex details, whenever required, and abstract out the details, when not needed. An informal survey to evaluate the interface indicated that our proposed technique can be helpful in tasks such as quick understanding of existing software projects, getting quick overview of others code.
image5 PhotoAlbum In this project, I created a photo album application from scratch using Java Swing. The application had ability to add or delete photos, annotate the a photo with text and drawings at its back, view all photo thumbnails in a light table, and scroll through the photos.
image4 Home Network Troubleshooting Strategies

This project involved conducting user studies to gather understand about the problems people have with computing, networking, AV equipment.Through the analysis results we found that once a problem occurs, the helpees initially try to solve the problem actively, but after reaching a threshold (which is determined by various factors such as time urgency, motivation, and degree of complexity) they seek help from helpers by asking for their active participant in problem solving, and the helpees then take a back seat by getting into passive mode of problem solving (which typically is learning mode, or ignoring by just getting the problem solved).”

 
image1 Influences Among Research Institutes In this project, we built visualization that aid in understanding the influences that research institutions in the domain of software engineering have on each other over a period of time. We define ’influence’ based on the number of papers that reference a paper published in University U, and the number of papers University U publishes in a conference C. The research institutes we included are universities and research organizations that actively publish in conferences. Please click here to view the video of the project demonstration.
PUBLICATIONS

Curriculum Vitae

[pdf]

 

 

 

 

 

 

INSPIRING QUOTATIONS
  • Challenges are high, The Dreams are new,
         The World out there is waiting for you.
         Dare to Dream, Dare to Try
         No goal is too Distant, No star is too High.
         Just Get Going.
  • Isn't it amazing .... Ph.D. is the only time in my life when I get paid to learn.
  • Innovation is the constant process of trial and error. You need the willingness to fail all the time - John Backus
  • Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted. (from Randy Pausch's talk). Maybe that's why people say that "Maturity comes with experience not with age."
  • Treat your thoughts as hypotheses than facts
  • Use logic and evidence to evaluate your thoughts
  • Now, at a certain time, in pleasant mood, 
    He tried the luxury of doing good.
    ~George Crabbe, Tales of the Hall (bk. III)~
  • When we stop competing against a rival and instead start competing against the situation, we perform far better

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