Accessibility Skip to Global Navigation Skip to Local Navigation Skip to Content Skip to Search Skip to Site Map Menu

Sherlock Licorish

Sherlock Licorish imageBSc(UoG), MSc, PhD(AUT)
Senior Lecturer

Room 3.41, Otago Business School
Tel +64 3 479 8319
Email sherlock.licorish@otago.ac.nz
Linkedin Sherlock Licorish

Background and interests

Dr Sherlock Licorish is a Senior Lecturer whose current research focuses on:

  • Modelling the software development process and evaluating the use of software methodologies, and particularly agile approaches.
    Modelling sample paper (PDF)
  • Exploring and evaluating software teams’ behaviour and performance under various conditions, or in addressing various forms of software activities (e.g. resolving defects or building new features, gathering software requirements, or performing software maintenance tasks).
    Behaviour sample paper (PDF)
  • The development and provision of software tools to aid software developers and enhance end-users’ involvement in the feedback processes. Dr Licorish is also interested in topics considered under market-driven (and crowd-sourced) requirements engineering.
    Software tools sample paper (PDF)
    Crowdsourcing sample paper (PDF)
  • Empirical software engineering and analytics, covering global software development, open source software (OSS) development and virtual communities.
    Global development sample paper (PDF)
    OSS sample paper (PDF)

Dr Licorish’s analytics research involves the use of data mining, data visualization, statistical analysis and other quantitative methods (e.g. social network analysis, linguistic and sentiment analysis, natural language processing (NLP) and probabilistic modelling techniques).

He has also used qualitative methods in his research, including qualitative forms of content analysis and dilemma analysis. These techniques (both quantitative and qualitative) are often applied to large repositories and software artefacts.

Dr Licorish serves as a reviewer for several top conferences and journals.

Dr Licorish is involved in the research group:
Information Systems and Software Engineering

^ Top of page

Papers

Supervision

Dr Licorish has been the recipient of a Supervisor Award.

Available postgraduate research opportunities:

Source Code analysis (fully funded PhD scholarship)

Currently supervising

  • Saurabh Malgaonkar
  • Elijah Zoldouarrati
  • Chathrie Wimalasooriya
  • Pascal Omondiagbe

Currently co-supervising

  • Priyanka Patel
  • Nuzla Ismail
  • Adriaan Lotter

^ Top of page

Publications

Licorish, S., Galster, M., Kapitsaki, G. M., & Tahir, A. (2022). Understanding students’ software development projects: Effort, performance, satisfaction, skills and their relation to the adequacy of outcomes developed. Journal of Systems & Software, 186, 111156. doi: 10.1016/j.jss.2021.111156

Wimalasooriya, C., Licorish, S. A., Alencar da Costa, D., & MacDonell, S. G. (2022). A systematic mapping study addressing the reliability of mobile applications: The need to move beyond testing reliability. Journal of Systems & Software, 186, 111166. doi: 10.1016/j.jss.2021.111166

Malgaonkar, S., Licorish, S. A., & Savarimuthu, B. T. R. (2022). Prioritizing user concerns in app reviews: A study of requests for new features, enhancements and bug fixes. Information & Software Technology, 144, 106798. doi: 10.1016/j.infsof.2021.106798

Malgaonkar, S., Licorish, S. A., & Savarimuthu, B. T. R. (2021). Automatically generating taxonomy for grouping app reviews: A study of three apps. Software Quality Journal. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1007/s11219-021-09570-1

Jaakola, M., Polvinen, T., Holvitie, J., Licorish, S. A., & Leppänen, V. (2021). From setting up innovation in a novel context to discovering sustainable business: A framework for short-term events. Proceedings of the 47th Euromicro Conference on Software Engineering and Advanced Applications (SEAA). (pp. 260-269). IEEE. doi: 10.1109/SEAA53835.2021.00040

Savarimuthu, B. T. R., Licorish, S. A., Devananda, M., Greenheld, G., Dignum, V., & Dignum, F. (2021). Developers' responses to app review feedback: A study of communication norms in app development. In A. Aler Tubella, S. Cranefield, C. Frantz, F. Meneguzzi & W. Vasconcelos (Eds.), Coordination, organizations, institutions, norms, and ethics for governance of multi-agent systems XIII: COIN 2017 & COINE 2020 International Workshops, revised selected papers: Lecture notes in artificial intelligence (Vol. 12298). (pp. 57-75). Cham, Switzerland: Springer Nature. doi: 10.1007/978-3-030-72376-7_4

Chapter in Book - Research

Licorish, S., Galster, M., Kapitsaki, G. M., & Tahir, A. (2022). Understanding students’ software development projects: Effort, performance, satisfaction, skills and their relation to the adequacy of outcomes developed. Journal of Systems & Software, 186, 111156. doi: 10.1016/j.jss.2021.111156

Journal - Research Article

Malgaonkar, S., Licorish, S. A., & Savarimuthu, B. T. R. (2022). Prioritizing user concerns in app reviews: A study of requests for new features, enhancements and bug fixes. Information & Software Technology, 144, 106798. doi: 10.1016/j.infsof.2021.106798

Journal - Research Article

Wimalasooriya, C., Licorish, S. A., Alencar da Costa, D., & MacDonell, S. G. (2022). A systematic mapping study addressing the reliability of mobile applications: The need to move beyond testing reliability. Journal of Systems & Software, 186, 111166. doi: 10.1016/j.jss.2021.111166

Journal - Research Article

Kuhrmann, M., Tell, P., Hebig, R., Klünder, J., Münch, J., Linssen, O., … Licorish, S. A., … Richardson, I. (2021). What makes agile software development agile? IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1109/tse.2021.3099532

Journal - Research Article

Malgaonkar, S., Licorish, S. A., & Savarimuthu, B. T. R. (2021). Automatically generating taxonomy for grouping app reviews: A study of three apps. Software Quality Journal. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1007/s11219-021-09570-1

Journal - Research Article

Zolduoarrati, E., & Licorish, S. A. (2021). On the value of encouraging gender tolerance and inclusiveness in software engineering communities. Information & Software Technology, 139, 106667. doi: 10.1016/j.infsof.2021.106667

Journal - Research Article

Meldrum, S., Licorish, S. A., Owen, C. A., & Savarimuthu, B. T. R. (2020). Understanding stack overflow code quality: A recommendation of caution. Science of Computer Programming, 199, 102516. doi: 10.1016/j.scico.2020.102516

Journal - Research Article

Owen, H. E., & Licorish, S. A. (2020). Game-based student response system: The effectiveness of Kahoot! on junior and senior information science students' learning. Journal of Information Technology Education: Research, 19, 511-553. doi: 10.28945/4608

Journal - Research Article

Tahir, A., Dietrich, J., Counsell, S., Licorish, S., & Yamashita, A. (2020). A large scale study on how developers discuss code smells and anti-pattern in Stack Exchange sites. Information & Software Technology, 125, 106333. doi: 10.1016/j.infsof.2020.106333

Journal - Research Article

Holvitie, J., Licorish, S. A., Spínola, R. O., Hyrynsalmi, S., MacDonell, S. G., Mendes, T. S., … Leppänen, V. (2018). Technical debt and agile software development practices and processes: An industry practitioner survey. Information & Software Technology, 96, 141-160. doi: 10.1016/j.infsof.2017.11.015

Journal - Research Article

Licorish, S. A., & MacDonell, S. G. (2018). Exploring the links between software development task type, team attitudes and task completion performance: Insights from the Jazz repository. Information & Software Technology, 97, 10-25. doi: 10.1016/j.infsof.2017.12.005

Journal - Research Article

Licorish, S. A., Owen, H. E., Daniel, B., & George, J. L. (2018). Students’ perception of Kahoot!’s influence on teaching and learning. Research & Practice in Technology Enhanced Learning, 13, 9. doi: 10.1186/s41039-018-0078-8

Journal - Research Article

Licorish, S. A., & MacDonell, S. G. (2017). Exploring software developers’ work practices: Task differences, participation, engagement, and speed of task resolution. Information & Management, 54(3), 364-382. doi: 10.1016/j.im.2016.09.005

Journal - Research Article

Meldrum, S., Savarimuthu, B. T. R., Licorish, S., Tahir, A., Bosu, M., & Jayakaran, P. (2017). Is knee pain information on YouTube videos perceived to be helpful? An analysis of user comments and implications for dissemination on social media. Digital Health, 3. doi: 10.1177/2055207617698908

Journal - Research Article

Licorish, S. A. (2016). Exploring the prevalence and evolution of android concerns: A community viewpoint. Journal of Software, 11(9), 848-869. doi: 10.17706/jsw.11.9.848-869

Journal - Research Article

Licorish, S. A., & MacDonell, S. G. (2015). Communication and personality profiles of global software developers. Information & Software Technology, 64, 113-131. doi: 10.1016/j.infsof.2015.02.004

Journal - Research Article

Licorish, S. A., & MacDonell, S. G. (2014). Understanding the attitudes, knowledge sharing behaviors and task performance of core developers: A longitudinal study. Information & Software Technology, 56(12), 1578-1596. doi: 10.1016/j.infsof.2014.02.004

Journal - Research Article

Malgaonkar, S., Licorish, S. A., & Savarimuthu, B. T. R. (2020). Understanding requirements prioritisation: Literature survey and critical evaluation. IET Software, 14(6), 607-622. doi: 10.1049/iet-sen.2019.0215

Journal - Research Other

Jaakola, M., Polvinen, T., Holvitie, J., Licorish, S. A., & Leppänen, V. (2021). From setting up innovation in a novel context to discovering sustainable business: A framework for short-term events. Proceedings of the 47th Euromicro Conference on Software Engineering and Advanced Applications (SEAA). (pp. 260-269). IEEE. doi: 10.1109/SEAA53835.2021.00040

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Malgaonkar, S., Licorish, S. A., & Savarimuthu, B. T. R. (2020). Towards automated taxonomy generation for grouping app reviews: A preliminary empirical study. Proceedings of the Communications in Computer and Information Science (QUATIC). (pp. 120-134). Cham, Switzerland: Springer. doi: 10.1007/978-3-030-58793-2_10

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Caires, V. C., Rios, N., Holvitie, J., Leppänen, V., Licorish, S. A., MacDonell, S. G., … Spínola, R. O. (2019). Processos e práticas ágeis sensíveis à dívida técnica: Comparação dos resultados de um survey executadao no Brasil, Finlândia e Nova Zelândia [Agile processes and practices sensitive to technical debt: Comparison of results of a survey executed in Brazil, Finland, and New Zealand]. Proceedings of the 25th Americas Conference on Information Systems (AMCIS). 151731. Retrieved from https://aisel.aisnet.org/amcis2019/spanish_portuguese_latin_america/spanish_portuguese_latin_america/30/

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Ismail, F. N., Woodford, B. J., & Licorish, S. A. (2019). Evaluating the boundaries of big data environments for machine learning. In J. Liu & J. Bailey (Eds.), Advances in artificial intelligence: Lecture notes in artificial intelligence (Vol. 11919). (pp. 253-264). Cham, Switzerland: Springer. doi: 10.1007/978-3-030-35288-2_21

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Klünder, J., Hebig, R., Tell, P., Kuhrmann, M., Nakatumba-Nabende, J., Heldal, R., … Licorish, S. A., … MacDonell, S. G. (2019). Catching up with method and process practice: An industry-informed baseline for researchers. Proceedings of the 41st Software Engineering International Conference: Software Engineering in Practice (ICSE-SEIP). (pp. 255-264). IEEE. doi: 10.1109/ICSE-SEIP.2019.00036

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Omondiagbe, O. P., Licorish, S. A., & MacDonell, S. G. (2019). Features that predict the acceptability of Java and JavaScript answers on Stack Overflow. Proceedings of the Evaluation and Assessment on Software Engineering (EASE). (pp. 101-110). ACM. doi: 10.1145/3319008.3319024

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Greenheld, G., Savarimuthu, B. T. R., & Licorish, S. A. (2018). Automating developers' responses to app reviews. Proceedings of the 25th Australasian Software Engineering Conference (ASWEC). (pp. 66-70). IEEE. doi: 10.1109/ASWEC.2018.00017

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Licorish, S. A., Zolduoarrati, E., & Stanger, N. (2018). Linking user requests, developer responses and code changes: Android OS case study. Proceedings of the 22nd International Conference on Evaluation and Assessment in Software Engineering. (pp. 79-89). ACM. doi: 10.1145/3210459.3210467

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Lotter, A., Licorish, S. A., Savarimuthu, B. T. R., & Meldrum, S. (2018). Code reuse in stack overflow and popular open source Java projects. Proceedings of the 25th Australasian Software Engineering Conference (ASWEC). (pp. 141-150). IEEE. doi: 10.1109/ASWEC.2018.00027

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Tahir, A., Yamashita, A., Licorish, S., Dietrich, J., & Counsell, S. (2018). Can you tell me if it smells? A study on how developers discuss code smells and anti-patterns in Stack Overflow. Proceedings of the 22nd International Conference on Evaluation and Assessment in Software Engineering (EASE). (pp. 68-78). New York, NY: ACM. doi: 10.1145/3210459.3210466

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Tell, P., MacDonell, S., & Licorish, S. A. (2018). 3rd workshop on hybrid development approaches in software system development. In M. Kuhrmann, K. Schneider, D. Pfahl, S. Amasaki, M. Ciolkowski, R. Hebig, … S. Küpper (Eds.), Product-Focused Software Process Improvement (PROFES): Lecture notes in computer science (Vol. 11271). (pp. 433-440). Cham, Switzerland: Springer. doi: 10.1007/978-3-030-03673-7_34

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Yasir, M., Michael, K., Savarimuthu, B. T. R., & Licorish, S. A. (2018). Formal in the informal: A multi-level analysis of core python developers' tweets. Proceedings of the 25th Australasian Software Engineering Conference (ASWEC). (pp. 151-160). IEEE. doi: 10.1109/ASWEC.2018.00028

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Diebold, P., Galster, M., Rainer, A., & Licorish, S. A. (2017). Interactive posters: An alternative to collect practitioners' experience. Proceedings of the 21st International Conference on Evaluation and Assessment in Software Engineering (EASE). (pp. 230-235). New York, NY: ACM. doi: 10.1145/3084226.3084272

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Licorish, S. A., George, J. L., Owen, H. E., & Daniel, B. (2017). “Go Kahoot!” enriching classroom engagement, motivation and learning experience with games. Proceedings of the 25th International Conference on Computers in Education (ICCE). (pp. 755-764). Retrieved from http://icce2017.canterbury.ac.nz

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Licorish, S. A., Savarimuthu, B. T. R., & Keertipati, S. (2017). Attributes that predict which features to fix: Lessons for App Store mining. Proceedings of the 21st International Conference on Evaluation and Assessment in Software Engineering (EASE). (pp. 108-117). New York, NY: ACM. doi: 10.1145/3084226.3084246

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Meldrum, S., Licorish, S. A., & Savarimuthu, B. T. R. (2017). Crowdsourced knowledge on stack overflow: A systematic mapping study. Proceedings of the 21st International Conference on Evaluation and Assessment in Software Engineering (EASE). (pp. 180-185). New York, NY: ACM. doi: 10.1145/3084226.3084267

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Sharma, P., Savarimuthu, B. T. R., Stanger, N., Licorish, S. A., & Rainer, A. (2017). Investigating developers' email discussions during decision-making in Python language evolution. Proceedings of the 21st International Conference on Evaluation and Assessment in Software Engineering (EASE). (pp. 286-291). New York, NY: ACM. doi: 10.1145/3084226.3084271

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Su'a, T., Licorish, S. A., Savarimuthu, B. T. R., & Langlotz, T. (2017). QuickReview: A novel data-driven mobile user interface for reporting problematic app features. Proceedings of the 22nd International Conference on Intelligent User Interfaces (IUI). (pp. 517-522). New York, NY: ACM. doi: 10.1145/3025171.3025178

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Holvitie, J., Licorish, S. A., & Leppänen, V. (2016). Modelling propagation of technical debt. Proceedings of the 42nd Euromicro Conference Series on Software Engineering and Advanced Applications (SEAA). (pp. 54-58). IEEE. doi: 10.1109/SEAA.2016.53

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Holvitie, J., Licorish, S. A., Martini, A., & Leppänen, V. (2016). Co-existence of the 'technical debt' and 'software legacy' concepts. In H. Lichter, K. Fögen, T. Sunetnanta, T. Anwar, A. Yamashita, L. Moonen, … A. Sureka (Eds.), Proceedings of the 4th International Workshop on Quantitative Approaches to Software Quality (QuASoQ) and the 1st International Workshop on Technical Debt Analysis (TDA). (pp. 80-83). Retrieved from http://ceur-ws.org/Vol-1771/

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Keertipati, S., Licorish, S., & Savarimuthu, B. T. R. (2016). Exploring decision-making processes in Python. Proceedings of the 20th International Conference on Evaluation and Assessment in Software Engineering (EASE). 43. New York: ACM. doi: 10.1145/2915970.2915993

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Keertipati, S., Savarimuthu, B. T. R., & Licorish, S. A. (2016). Approaches for prioritizing feature improvements extracted from app reviews. Proceedings of the 20th International Conference on Evaluation and Assessment in Software Engineering (EASE). 33. New York: ACM. doi: 10.1145/2915970.2916003

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Lee, C. W., Licorish, S. A., Savarimuthu, B. T. R., & MacDonell, S. G. (2016). Augmenting text mining approaches with social network analysis to understand the complex relationships among users’ requests: A case study of the android operating system. In T. X. Bui & R. H. Sprague (Eds.), Proceedings of the 49th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS). (pp. 1144-1153). IEEE. doi: 10.1109/HICSS.2016.145

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Licorish, S. A., Holvitie, J., Hyrynsalmi, S., Leppänen, V., Spínola, R. O., Mendes, T. S., MacDonell, S. G., & Buchan, J. (2016). Adoption and suitability of software development methods and practices. Proceedings of the 23rd Asia-Pacific Software Engineering Conference (APSEC). (pp. 369-372). IEEE. doi: 10.1109/APSEC.2016.062

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Patel, P., Licorish, S., Savarimuthu, B. T. R., & MacDonell, S. (2016). Studying expectation violations in socio-technical systems: A case study of the mobile app community. Proceedings of the 24th European Conference on Information Systems (ECIS). 14. Retrieved from http://aisel.aisnet.org/ecis2016_rp/14

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Savarimuthu, T., Dam, H. K., Licorish, S. A., Keertipati, S., Avery, D., & Ghose, A. K. (2016). Process compliance in open source software development: A study of Python Enhancement Proposals (PEPS). Proceedings of the 24th European Conference on Information Systems (ECIS). 48. Retrieved from http://aisel.aisnet.org/ecis2016_rp/48

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Licorish, S. A., Lee, C. W., Savarimuthu, B. T. R., Patel, P., & MacDonell, S. G. (2015). They’ll know it when they see it: Analyzing post-release feedback from the android community. Proceedings of the 21st Americas Conference on Information Systems (AMCIS). Retrieved from http://aisel.aisnet.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1407&context=amcis2015

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Licorish, S. A., MacDonell, S. G., & Clear, T. (2015). Analyzing confidentiality and privacy concerns: Insights from Android issue logs. Proceedings of the 19th Evaluation and Assessment in Software Engineering (EASE) International Conference. 18. New York: ACM. doi: 10.1145/2745802.2745819

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Licorish, S. A., Tahir, A., Bosu, M. F., & MacDonell, S. G. (2015). On satisfying the Android OS community: User feedback still central to developers' portfolios. Proceedings of the 24th Australasian Software Engineering Conference (ASWEC). (pp. 78-87). IEEE. doi: 10.1109/aswec.2015.19

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Licorish, S. A., & MacDonell, S. G. (2014). Combining text mining and visualization techniques to study teams' behavioral processes. Proceedings of the 4th Workshop on Mining Unstructured Data (MUD). (pp. 16-20). IEEE. doi: 10.1109/MUD.2014.10

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

Licorish, S. A., & MacDonell, S. G. (2014). Personality profiles of global software developers. Proceedings of the 18th International Conference on Evaluation and Assessment in Software Engineering (EASE). 45. New York: ACM. doi: 10.1145/2601248.2601265

Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Full paper

More publications...