About
I'm a PhD student in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Warwick in Coventry, UK, researching machine-learning-based compiler optimization. Before that I spent 2+ years in industry as a compiler engineer at WSO2.
Education
- PhD in Computer Science, University of Warwick, UK (Sep 2024 – Present). Compiler optimization with machine learning: MLIR compiler passes, AI and stencil compiler stacks. Supervisor: Prof. Gihan Mudalige.
- BSc Engineering (Hons), Electronic and Telecommunication Engineering, University of Moratuwa, Sri Lanka (Oct 2017 – Aug 2022).
Publications
- A. Dascombe, P. Thilakaraj, and G. R. Mudalige. Code Generation with MLIR for the OPS Structured-Mesh DSL. Twelfth Workshop on the LLVM Compiler Infrastructure in HPC (LLVM-HPC2026), held with SC26, Chicago, IL, Nov 2026. Accepted.
Talks
- Multi Stage Sequential RL for MLIR Meta-Optimization. 7th MLIR Workshop, European LLVM Developers' Meeting (EuroLLVM 2026), Dublin, Ireland, Apr 2026.
- Multi Stage Sequential Reinforcement Environment for MLIR Optimization. Warwick Postgraduate Colloquium in Computer Science (WPCCS), University of Warwick, 2025.
Experience
- Senior Software Engineer, WSO2 (Feb 2024 – Sep 2024). Primary contributor to the Ballerina JSON Data library and previous CODEOWNER.
- Software Engineer, WSO2 (May 2022 – Feb 2024). Compiler developer for the Ballerina language, and primary contributor to the XML Data library and previous CODEOWNER.
- Trainee Electronic Engineer, Effective Solutions Pvt. Ltd. (Oct 2020 – Apr 2021). Developed MYNDRONE, a brain-computer interface that steers a programmable drone using EEG signals.
Selected projects
- MARLIR. Reinforcement learning framework that used to develop MARL optimizations for MLIR based compilers.
- OPS-MLIR. Co-developed an MLIR compiler for the OPS structured-mesh DSL that JIT-lowers OPS abstractions to OpenMP and CUDA backends.
- mini-nn. Small MLIR-based neural network compiler that lowers an nn dialect to Linalg.
- Ballerina Compiler, JSON Data and XML Data libraries. Open-source compiler front-end and data-binding work.
Teaching
University of Warwick: CS325 Compiler Design (2024/25, 2025/26, 2026/27), CS402 High Performance Computing (2025/26), CS126 Design of Information Structures (2024/25), CS133 Professional Skills (2025/26).