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annotate doc/v2_planning/learner.txt @ 1042:4eaf576c3e9a

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author Dumitru Erhan <dumitru.erhan@gmail.com>
date Wed, 08 Sep 2010 11:18:00 -0400
parents 38cc6e075d9b
children 3f528656855b
rev   line source
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38cc6e075d9b PV added to learner committee
Yoshua Bengio <bengioy@iro.umontreal.ca>
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1
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2 Comittee: AB, PL, GM, IG, RP, NB, PV
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3 Leader: ?
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5 Discussion of Function Specification for Learner Types
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6 ======================================================
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7
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8 In its most abstract form, a learner is an object with the
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9 following semantics:
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11 * A learner has named hyper-parameters that control how it learns (these can be viewed
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12 as options of the constructor, or might be set directly by a user)
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13
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14 * A learner also has an internal state that depends on what it has learned.
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15
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16 * A learner reads and produces data, so the definition of learner is
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17 intimately linked to the definition of dataset (and task).
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18
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19 * A learner has one or more 'train' or 'adapt' functions by which
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20 it is given a sample of data (typically either the whole training set, or
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21 a mini-batch, which contains as a special case a single 'example'). Learners
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22 interface with datasets in order to obtain data. These functions cause the
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23 learner to change its internal state and take advantage to some extent
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24 of the data provided. The 'train' function should take charge of
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25 completely exploiting the dataset, as specified per the hyper-parameters,
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26 so that it would typically be called only once. An 'adapt' function
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27 is meant for learners that can operate in an 'online' setting where
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28 data continually arrive and the control loop (when to stop) is to
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29 be managed outside of it. For most intents and purposes, the
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30 'train' function could also handle the 'online' case by providing
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31 the controlled iterations over the dataset (which would then be
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32 seen as a stream of examples).
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33 * learner.train(dataset)
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34 * learner.adapt(data)
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35
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36 * Different types of learners can then exploit their internal state
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37 in order to perform various computations after training is completed,
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38 or in the middle of training, e.g.,
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39
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40 * y=learner.predict(x)
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41 for learners that see (x,y) pairs during training and predict y given x,
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42 or for learners that see only x's and learn a transformation of it (i.e. feature extraction).
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43 Here and below, x and y are tensor-like objects whose first index iterates
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44 over particular examples in a batch or minibatch of examples.
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45
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46 * p=learner.probability(examples)
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47 p=learner.log_probability(examples)
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48 for learners that can estimate probability density or probability functions,
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49 note that example could be a pair (x,y) for learners that expect each example
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50 to represent such a pair. The second form is provided in case the example
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51 is high-dimensional and computations in the log-domain are numerically preferable.
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52 The first dimension of examples or of x and y is an index over a minibatch or a dataset.
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53
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54 * p=learner.free_energy(x)
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55 for learners that can estimate a log unnormalized probability; the output has the same length as the input.
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56
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57 * c=learner.costs(examples)
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58 returns a matrix of costs (one row per example, i.e., again the output has the same length
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59 as the input), the first column of which represents the cost whose expectation
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60 we wish to minimize over new samples from the unknown underlying data distribution.
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61
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62
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63 Some learners may be able to handle x's and y's that contain missing values.
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64
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65 * For convenience, some of these operations could be bundled, e.g.
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66
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67 * [prediction,costs] = learner.predict_and_adapt((x,y))
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68
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69 * Some learners could include in their internal state not only what they
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70 have learned but some information about recently seen examples that conditions
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71 the expected distribution of upcoming examples. In that case, they might
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72 be used, e.g. in an online setting as follows:
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73 for (x,y) in data_stream:
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74 [prediction,costs]=learner.predict((x,y))
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75 accumulate_statistics(prediction,costs)
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76
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77 * In some cases, each example is itself a (possibly variable-size) sequence
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78 or other variable-size object (e.g. an image, or a video)
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85
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89 James's idea for Learner Interface
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90 ===================================
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91
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92 Theory:
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93 -------
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94
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95 Think about the unfolding of a learning algorithm as exploring a path in a vast
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96 directed graph.
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97
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98 There are some source nodes, which are potential initial conditions for the
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99 learning algorithm.
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100
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101 At any node, there are a number of outgoing labeled edges that represent
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102 distinct directions of exploration: like "allocate a model with N hidden units",
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103 or "set the l1 weight decay on such-and-such units to 0.1" or "adapt for T
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104 iterations" or "refresh the GPU dataset memory with the next batch of data".
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105
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106 Not all nodes have the same outgoing edge labels. The dataset, model, and
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107 optimization algorithm implementations may each have their various
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108 hyper-parameters with various restrictions on what values they can take, and
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109 when they can be changed.
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110
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111 Every move in this graph incurs some storage and computational expense, and
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112 explores the graph.
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114 Learners typically engage in goal-directed exploration of this graph - for
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115 example to find the node with the best validation-set performance given a
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116 certain computational budget. We might often be interested in the best node
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117 found.
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118
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119 The predict(), log_probability(), free_energy() etc correspond to costs that we
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120 can measure at any particular node (at some computational expense) to see how we
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121 are doing in our exploration.
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122
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123 Many semantically distinct components come into the definition of this graph:
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124 the model (e.g. DAA) the dataset (e.g. an online one), the inference and
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125 learning strategy. I'm not sure what to call this graph than an 'experiment
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126 graph'... so I'll go with that for now.
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127
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128
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129
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130
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131
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132 Use Cases
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133 ----------
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134
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135 Early stopping
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136 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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137
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138 Early stopping can be implemented as a learner that progresses along a
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139 particular kind of edge (e.g. "train more") until a stopping criterion (in terms
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140 of a cost computed from nodes along the path) is met.
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141
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142
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143 Grid Search
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144 ~~~~~~~~~~~
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145
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146 Grid search is a learner policy that can be implemented in an experiment graph
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147 where all paths have the form:
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148
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149 ( "set param 0 to X",
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150 "set param 1 to Y",
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151 ... ,
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152 "set param N to Z",
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153 adapt,
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154 [early stop...],
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155 test)
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156
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157 It would explore all paths of this form and then return the best node.
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158
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159
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160 Stagewise learning of DBNs combined with early stopping and grid search
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161 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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162
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163 This would be a learner that is effective for experiment graphs that reflect the
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164 greedy-stagewise optimization of DBNs.
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165
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166
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167 Boosting
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168 ~~~~~~~~
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169
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170 Given an ExperimentGraph that permits re-weighting of examples, it is
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171 straightforward to write a meta-ExperimentGraph around it that implements AdaBoost.
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172 A meta-meta-ExperimentGraph around that that does early-stopping would complete
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173 the picture and make a useful boosting implementation.
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174
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175
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176
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177 Implementation Details / API
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178 ----------------------------
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179
1037
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180 TODO: PUT IN TERMINOLOGY OF LEARNER, HYPER-LEARNER.
1038
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181
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182 TODO: SEPARATE DISCUSSION OF PERSISTENT STORAGE FROM LEARNER INTERFACE.
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183
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184 TODO: API describing hyperparameters (categorical, integer, bounds on values, etc.)
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185
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186 TODO: use-case - show how we could use the optimizer from
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187 http://www.cs.ubc.ca/labs/beta/Projects/ParamILS/
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188
1026
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189 ExperimentGraph
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190 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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191
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192 One API that needs to be defined for this perspective to be practical is the
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193 ExperimentGraph. I'll present it in terms of global functions, but an
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194 object-oriented things probably makes more sense in the code itself.
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195
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196
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197 def explored_nodes(graph):
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198 """Return iterator over explored nodes (ints? objects?)"""
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199
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200 def forget_nodes(graph, nodes):
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201 """Clear the nodes from memory (save space)"""
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202
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203 def all_edges_from(graph, node):
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204 """Return iterator over all possible edges
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205
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206 Edges might be parametric - like "set learn_rate to (float)"
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207
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208 Edges might contain a reference to their 'from' end... not sure.
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209
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210 """
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211 def explored_edges_from(graph, node):
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212 """Return the edges that have been explored
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213 """
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214
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215 def add_node(graph, new_node):
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216 """add a node. It may be serialized."""
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217
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218 def add_edge(graph, edge):
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219 """add edge, it may be serialize"""
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220
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221 def connect(graph, from_node, to_node, edge):
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222 """
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223 to_node = None for un-explored edge
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224 """
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225
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226 It makes sense to have one ExperimentGraph implementation for each storage
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227 mechanism - Memory, JobMan, sqlite, couchdb, mongodb, etc.
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228
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229 The nodes should be serializable objects (like the 'learner' objects in Yoshua's
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230 text above, so that you can do node.learner.predict() if the edge leading to
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231 `node` trained something new).
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232
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233 The nodes could also contain the various costs (train, valid, test), and other
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234 experiment statistics that are node-specific.
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235
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236
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237 Some implementations might also include functions for asynchronous updating of
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238 the ExperimentGraph:
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239
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240
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241 ExperimentGraphEdge
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242 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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243
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244 The ExperimentGraph is primarily a dictionary container for nodes and edges.
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245 An ExperimentGraphEdge implementation is the model-dependent component that
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246 actually interprets the edges as computations.
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247
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248 def estimate_compute_time(graph, node, edge):
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249 """Return an estimated walltime expense for the computation"""
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250
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251 def compute_edge(graph, node, edge, async=False, priority=1):
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252 """Run the computations assocated with this graph edge, and store the
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253 resulting 'to_node' to the graph when complete.
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254
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255 If async is True, the function doesn't return until the graph is updated
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256 with `to_node`.
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257
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258 The priority is used by implementations that use cluster software or
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259 something to manage a worker pool that computes highest-priority edges
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260 first.
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261
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262 """
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263
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264 def list_compute_queue(graph):
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265 """Return edges scheduled for exploration (and maybe a handle for
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266 where/when they started running and other backend details)
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267 """
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268
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269 Different implementations of ExperimentGraphExplorer will correspond to
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270 different experiments. There can also be ExperimentGraphExplorer
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271 implementations that are proxies, and perform the computations in different
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272 threads, or across ssh, or cluster software.
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273
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274
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275 Learner
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276 ~~~~~~~
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277
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278 A learner is a program that implements a policy for graph exploration by
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279 exploiting the ExperimentGraph and ExperimentGraphEdge interfaces.
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280
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281 The convenience of the API hinges on the extent to which we can implement
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282 policies that work on different experiment-graphs (where the labels on the edges
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283 and semantics are different). The use-cases above make me optimistic that it
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284 will work sufficiently well to be worth doing in the absence of better ideas.
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285
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286
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287
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288