Colombian among the ten best systems engineers in the world

This woman from Cali acquired the math and software skills through study. He is now part of the Executive Committee of the Technical Council in Software Engineering.

That young woman who 18 years ago took the risk of studying a career in numbers, algorithms and mathematics, today is one of the ten most outstanding systems engineers in the world and the only one in Latin America, recently nominated for the largest and most prestigious governing body of engineers in that area on the planet. Quite an honor for Norha Villegas Machado from Cali.

The other nominees are from countries advanced in software and computing creation: Germany, Switzerland, the United States, Australia, Italy and the Netherlands. Their competitors have been in research for 20 or 30 years or more. And she has only been directing research groups at the Icesi University for just six years, where she also did her undergraduate degree. This slim-built, soft-spoken woman is a world-renowned computing research powerhouse. His designs or innovations in software programs earned him his name to be a member of the Executive Committee of the Technical Council in Software Engineering (TCSE), a department of the largest association of engineers in the world (IEEE, for its acronym in English). That is equivalent to entering the most important computer society in the world, especially in the area of software, a field to which she is dedicated. In fact, she is the first Spanish-speaking person proposed to enter such a select club.

The election is done by 'online' voting, but since Colombia has few members of the IEEE - membership alone costs half a million pesos annually - it did not get enough votes. But the nomination speaks of her projection at her age: 34 years old. What was her algorithm to get there? After graduating from Icesi she began working in the software industry in Cali, she soon joined Icesi as a teacher, in 2007 she became a full-time teacher. But when she dances Cuban salsa, Fania or practices aerumba or swimming, no one guesses that in 2009 she obtained her doctorate in computing at the University of Victoria, Canada, where she studied as a scholarship and of which she is now an associate professor. .

She now belongs to a very recognized research community that has given her roles that have allowed that Hispanic name to be heard among others from other languages and latitudes. So much so that this calm and simple Cali woman is one of the most referenced by Google Scholar: on the day of this interview there were 1,139 articles that cite her research, a very high number for someone with five years of research in such a competitive area in developed countries. . Her contributions have global resonance. Her doctoral thesis was impactful because she developed software systems that adapt to the context and situation of the entrepreneur or user. For example, software 'expands or contracts' depending on the number of people connected simultaneously. “This will allow an electronic marketing company to adapt its system to the needs and not block if there are many clients connected, or 'shrink' if there are few; “This way you save energy and money and optimize your resources,” she explains in Christian her techniques and methods called recommendation systems in context.

She carried out the project together with her husband, Gabriel Tamura, a Japanese also a researcher and whom she considers the person who knows the most about software architecture in Colombia and with merits of her own. The fact that they both have the built-in 'chip' of software design allows them to work and travel together, which makes family life and their professional development easier. Nohra has managed to specify its software designs so much, that it also surprised by creating a program that allows the use of historical information: for example, the database of a supermarket manages to identify when the customer has an anniversary, a birthday or is going on vacation, and make offers of promotions or consumer suggestions. Model that she applies to recommend actions in health, education, in public entities and in any branch imaginable.

Another of her “inventions” that she has liked the most is software to detect when a company's system is about to collapse, fail, or crash. Then, the program turns on the alarm and the organization can react to avoid this system failure that can lead to million-dollar losses in equipment, work, and information. These and many more studies have been published in 30 international publications, another number that is very high for Colombia and which are the ones consulted and cited as references in other papers. What motivated you to lean towards mathematics and become a systems engineer? Easy: her father, Pedro Villegas, a transportation businessman, put her in charge of accounting for the family business almost since she learned to count.

This woman from Cali acquired the math and software skills through study. He is now part of the Executive Committee of the Technical Council in Software Engineering.

That young woman who 18 years ago took the risk of studying a career in numbers, algorithms and mathematics, today is one of the ten most outstanding systems engineers in the world and the only one in Latin America, recently nominated for the largest and most prestigious governing body of engineers in that area on the planet. Quite an honor for Norha Villegas Machado from Cali.

The other nominees are from countries advanced in software and computing creation: Germany, Switzerland, the United States, Australia, Italy and the Netherlands. Their competitors have been in research for 20 or 30 years or more. And she has only been directing research groups at the Icesi University for just six years, where she also did her undergraduate degree. This slim-built, soft-spoken woman is a world-renowned computing research powerhouse. His designs or innovations in software programs earned him his name to be a member of the Executive Committee of the Technical Council in Software Engineering (TCSE), a department of the largest association of engineers in the world (IEEE, for its acronym in English). That is equivalent to entering the most important computer society in the world, especially in the area of software, a field to which she is dedicated. In fact, she is the first Spanish-speaking person proposed to enter such a select club.

The election is done by 'online' voting, but since Colombia has few members of the IEEE - membership alone costs half a million pesos annually - it did not get enough votes. But the nomination speaks of her projection at her age: 34 years old. What was her algorithm to get there? After graduating from Icesi she began working in the software industry in Cali, she soon joined Icesi as a teacher, in 2007 she became a full-time teacher. But when she dances Cuban salsa, Fania or practices aerumba or swimming, no one guesses that in 2009 she obtained her doctorate in computing at the University of Victoria, Canada, where she studied as a scholarship and of which she is now an associate professor. .

She now belongs to a very recognized research community that has given her roles that have allowed that Hispanic name to be heard among others from other languages and latitudes. So much so that this calm and simple Cali woman is one of the most referenced by Google Scholar: on the day of this interview there were 1,139 articles that cite her research, a very high number for someone with five years of research in such a competitive area in developed countries. . Her contributions have global resonance. Her doctoral thesis was impactful because she developed software systems that adapt to the context and situation of the entrepreneur or user. For example, software 'expands or contracts' depending on the number of people connected simultaneously. “This will allow an electronic marketing company to adapt its system to the needs and not block if there are many clients connected, or 'shrink' if there are few; “This way you save energy and money and optimize your resources,” she explains in Christian her techniques and methods called recommendation systems in context.

She carried out the project together with her husband, Gabriel Tamura, a Japanese also a researcher and whom she considers the person who knows the most about software architecture in Colombia and with merits of her own. The fact that they both have the built-in 'chip' of software design allows them to work and travel together, which makes family life and their professional development easier. Nohra has managed to specify its software designs so much, that it also surprised by creating a program that allows the use of historical information: for example, the database of a supermarket manages to identify when the customer has an anniversary, a birthday or is going on vacation, and make offers of promotions or consumer suggestions. Model that she applies to recommend actions in health, education, in public entities and in any branch imaginable.

Another of her “inventions” that she has liked the most is software to detect when a company's system is about to collapse, fail, or crash. Then, the program turns on the alarm and the organization can react to avoid this system failure that can lead to million-dollar losses in equipment, work, and information. These and many more studies have been published in 30 international publications, another number that is very high for Colombia and which are the ones consulted and cited as references in other papers. What motivated you to lean towards mathematics and become a systems engineer? Easy: her father, Pedro Villegas, a transportation businessman, put her in charge of accounting for the family business almost since she learned to count.