Kia ora, I’m David!

I’m studying towards a PhD in Computer Science at the University of Waikato, based in Hamilton, New Zealand – which isn’t far from Hobbiton! I began my PhD during our first nation-wide lockdown, on the auspicious date of April 1 2020.

My long-suffering supervisors are Professor Mark Apperley, Professor David Bainbridge and Dr Andreea Calude. Against their better judgement, they’re helping me to develop novel visualisation techniques for exploring multidimensional categorical data. (I won’t bore you with the details; just know that my work is crucial to humanity and, like all PhDs, will most definitely “transform the way we think or act”.)

Being a self-professed linguistics nerd, I’m particularly interested in applying my very important techniques (VITs?) to language analysis. More often than not, that means I’m working with New Zealand English (NZE) or te reo Māori, the Indigenous language of Aotearoa New Zealand. Check out Kiwi Words for more information about related projects.

In my spare time, I enjoy reading, travelling, playing games (but weirdly, not gaming), exploring the outdoors and generally keeping active. Did I mention I have a chocolate addiction? My family and friends can attest to my razor-sharp wit and likeability (not to mention my modesty).

Feel free to reach out if you’d like to know more!

*PhD stands for “Please help David”, preferably before his next breakdown.