About

Here is a bio of myself

Greetings, esteemed visitor! My name is Ercan, and I have currently pursued a PhD at the University of Bristol, where my primary research area is centered around the development of context-aware recommender systems. These systems have enormous potential in the tourism and leisure planning sector, as well as in the health domain, and I am eager to explore their applications.

I am extremely fortunate to have the guidance of Prof Seth Bullock, an accomplished academic and a staunch supporter of my work. His vast experience and knowledge have been instrumental in shaping my research, and I am grateful for the invaluable insights he provides. Additionally, I am also privileged to have Prof Jonathan Lawry as my co-supervisor, whose expertise in Intelligent System Lab has been a tremendous asset to my research.

From a young age, I have been fascinated by digital devices and online technologies, and I have always been driven to find solutions to the problems that arise from their use. This passion led me to pursue a career in Software Engineering, where I had the opportunity to work in the industry for three years. However, I am now focused on pursuing an academic career, where I can use my skills and knowledge to tackle cutting-edge problems in both industry and academia.

My academic journey began with two bachelor's degrees in Computer Education and Instructional Technologies, with a double major in Software Engineering, from the Bahçeşehir University in Turkey. As a testament to my academic dedication and curiosity, I spent six months as an exchange student at EPITA in Paris, France. Finally, I received an MSc in Advanced Computer Science from the the University of Essex before embarking on my current PhD journey.

My Publications

Recent Publications

Latest News

News

20 Mar'23 I am happy to announce that I have submitted my PhD thesis. Looking forward to new adventures now.

29 Jul'19 Another acceptance notification of our paper has been received from Rectour Workshop organisers. I will be presenting poster of our workshop paper at 13th ACM RecSys taking place in Denmark, Copenhagen on Thursday 19th September between 15:30-16:00 during RecTour Workshop Poster session.

18 Jul'19 Acceptance notification of special session paper has been received from SMC Special Session organisers. I will be presenting our research at 2019 IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics (IEEE SMC 2019). taking place in Bari, Italy. I am so exicited to meet new people during the conference.

16 Jul'19 My registration for 13th ACM RecSys conference has been done. I will be in Denmark, Copenhagen between 15th to 21st of September,2019. Please visit registration desk for a quick chat with me as I am a student volunteer in the conference and will be working in the registration desk on the first day of the conference.

16 Jul'19 Application for SMC 2019 Student Travel Grant Application has been sent. Organisers are very positive about student application that grants students about 400£ to be used during their travel to SMC 2019 conference which will be held in Bari, Italy on 6-9 October.

05 Jul'19 Proudly been awarded as a Student Volunteer(SV) role in one of the most prestigious conference(13th ACM RecSys ) in Recommender Systems field which will be held in Denmark, Copenhagen between 15-20 September 2019. The award will allow me to connect with other SVs and conference organisers, Additionally, I will be exempt from paying registration fees of about 500£.

1 Jun'19 Time for a short break. I will be visiting my Families in Turkey thus will be away between 9-29 June,2019. Follow my twitter account for some pictures of my visit.

30 May'19 Exciting News! My first year progress in the PhD position have been evaluated as succesfull by reviewers. Time to implement my findings.

23 May'19 DSRS and Bristol’s Jean Golding Institute organise RESULTS Interdisciplinary workshop – For more information please visit: DSRS Blog page

01 Mar'19 We are glad to announce 1st International Workshop on Personalisation and Decision Support for Citizen Service Enhancement at Scale - IEEE Smart-PDS 2019. Me and my academic supervisor Dr. Carrascosa will be organising this workshop that is a part of 3rd International Conference on Smart City Innovations. Please see workshop page for more information.

22 Jan'19 School of Computer Science attained me as a Teaching Support Assistant for the course Applied Data Science. I will be mentoring two teams of 5 students on data science projects related to social networks.

19 Dec'18 We visited Granada University and each member of our group gave a short seminar about our research background to a group of researcher including a pioneer in data science field, Prof Paco Herrera. Additionally, we visited the UJAMI Ambient Smart-Lab at University of Jean where Dr. Macarena Espinilla showcased some of their practical work with sensors.

17 Dec'18 DSRS group to visit Spain. Our Research Group is going to meet a pioneer in Group Decision Making in Granada for new collaboration opportunuties. We are planning to give a short talk about our background.

29/30 Nov'18 We are pleased to attend DMRS workshop as complete DSRS Research Group members. This two-day event let us to explore latest development in Decision Saking and Recommender Systems along with comments/discussions from pioneers in this field. Looking forward to attend future ones.

24/25 Nov'18 Great news from the lates event I participated. I have participated a two-days Hackhaton organised by ConnectingBristol and BBC Digital Cities Week. My team Eco Road Warriors has won the best application award and also won a prize in following Our Data Projects – Pitching and Commissioning Session event.

08 Oct'18 Me and my academic supervisor Dr. Ivan Palomares will visit Alan Turing Institute on 30th of October for orientation event. The event promise new networking opportunities with existing and new Turing Fellows.

23 Oct'18 It is an honour to announce that my application for Bristol University Alumni Mobility Grant Award is evaluated positively and I have been granted Travel Award of 450£ for our visit in Italy.

03 Oct'18 A good news about our extended abstract paper sent to DMRS'18 event in Bolzano'Italy. We will be presenting our work in workshop with James Neve and Dr Ivan Palomares.

06 Oct'18 I will be presenting a workshop paper in RecSys'18 ceonference taking place in Canada,Vancouver. Come along if you are around on saturday.

Sep'18 We are finally announcing the publication of our DSRS group websitewebsite where we will be releasing up-to-date info about DSRS group members and projects. Please check it out.

Sep'18 Bristol University Computer Science office allocated me an HPT unit in the course of "EMAT10007- Intro to Programming" for the first semester.

Jul'18 I am glad to be granted a fee schoolarship worth 1000£ by the panel of Essex Big Data and Analytics Summer School(IADS). I will be participating a two-weeks IADS summer school between 23 July - 3 August 2018 at University of Essex where I did my masters.

12 Jul'18, Due to nature of my academic studies, Prof Peter Flach agreed to be my co-supervisor from now on. Please click here to see his personal page.

Jul'18, I am back on twitter!!! Please follow me on twitter! @ercan_ezin

May'18, I am happy to announce that I started my PhD at University of Bristol under the supervision of Dr. Ivan Palomares Carrascosa. I will be working on Tourism and Leisure Recommender Systems.

Education

Educational BACKGROUND

Started: 21st of May'18

Award date: 20th of Mar'23

Academic Supervisor: Prof Seth Bullock (Web)

Academic Co-Supervisor: Prof Jonathan Lawry (Web)

Thesis title:Towards Context-Aware REcommender Systems for Tourists

Started: 06th of Oct'16

Award date: 04th of Oct'17

Supervisor: Prof Dr Riccardo Poli(Web) and Dr Caterina Cinel (Web)

Thesis title:Feasibility study of Brain Computer Interface P300-based Speller with Sequential Stimulation

GPA:65/100

Experience

Work Experience

Etiya - Full Stack Developer 09/2014 - 02/2016
(Istanbul/Turkey)

This is one of the big tech companies in Turkey that consists of around 500 employers in three local and two international branches. I was responsible to develop Java based solutions in Telaura framework with a team of 40 people in Agile Development style for the third biggest telecom company in Turkey called Turk Telekom Mobile.

Solid-ICT - Java EE Software Engineer 01/2014 - 09/2014
(Istanbul/Turkey)

My role was in back-end solutions team. I was responsible to develop and support Java Web and back-end projects that use Spring Framework with dependencies such as Thymeleaf, Guava, and Apache Shiro.

Innova - Jr. CRM Consultant 06/2013 - 01/2014
(Istanbul/Turkey)

I worked in Business Solutions Department where we were developing Microsoft Dynamics CRM for International Companies.

Mezun Group - PHP and Android Developer 08/2012 - 02/2013
(Istanbul/Turkey)

The role of my team was to develope Affiliate module of Mezun Group and developed front-end and some back-end component of Mezun Call Android App.

Bahçeşehir University Corporate Communications Department 07/2009 - 10/2009
(Istanbul/Turkey)

I worked as a student representative of the university within the main campus and also in a job career fair. Additionally, I worked in a call-center to phone thousands of student candidates to offer them the prospectus of the university.

Activities

activities & awards

05 Jul'18 Proudly been awarded a Student Volunteer(SV) role in one of the most prestigious conference(13th ACM RecSys ) in Recommender Systems field which will be held in Denmark, Copenhagen between 16-20 September 2019. The award will allow me to make new connection with other SVs and conference organisers, Additionally, I will be exempt from paying registration fees of about 500£

(Image source: Official 13th ACM RecSys page)


Oct'18 It is an honour to be granted Bristol University Alumni Travel Grant by Alumni comitee. The fund will be used during my trip to DMRS workshop in Italy, Bolzano. More detail above in News section.

24/25 Oct'18 Great news from the lates event I participated. I have participated a two-days Hackhaton organised by ConnectingBristol and BBC Digital Cities Week. My team Eco Road Warriors has won the best application award and also won a prize in following Our Data Projects – Pitching and Commissioning Session event.

Get in Touch

Contact

1 Cathedral Square, University of Bristol, BS1 5DD, Bristol, United Kingdom

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