# Tensorflow Hints

## Add logs to Summary Writer outside from graph

Usual we use summary writer in such way:

# inside graph definition
tf.scalar_summary("some_var", some_var)

# inside graph execution
with tf.Session() as sess:
summary_writer = tf.train.SummaryWriter('logs_dir')
merged_summary = tf.merge_all_summaries()
# get results from session execution

summary = tf.session.run(merged_summary)


As you can see you can get only variables from the graph. But what if we want some post processing(for example mean loss per epoch, not per batch) of just add some self generated data? In this case we may generate summary by hands.

# no any definitions inside graph or session fetches.
with tf.Session() as sess:
summary_writer = tf.train.SummaryWriter('logs_dir')
summary = tf.Summary(value=[
tf.Summary.Value(tag="some_tag", simple_value=some_value),
tf.Summary.Value(tag="mean_loss", simple_value=mean_loss)
])


## Handle Memory Consumption by Graph

During training graphs on GPUs you may note that graph take all available free memory. But what in case you have very simple model and just want to run 2 or 3 of the on GPU? For such case you may use config inside session, that will provide to the model only required amount of memory. More about this you may read in tensorflow official docs.

config = tf.ConfigProto()
config.gpu_options.allow_growth = True
session = tf.Session(config=config, ...)


## Dynamic vs. Static RNNs

Just forget about static RNNs, use Dynamic for your purposes. They are faster to build and also not required manual resizing/spliting of the input data. Full explanation why is it so you may found here.

inputs = tf.placeholder(tf.int32, shape=[batch_size, num_steps])

# usual RNN
inputs_splited = [tf.squeeze(input_step, [1])
for input_step in tf.split(1, num_steps, inputs)]
outputs, state = tf.nn.rnn(
cell,
inputs_splited,
dtype=tf.float64)

# for dynamic RNN we not required reshaping
outputs, state = tf.nn.dynamic_rnn(
cell,
inputs,
dtype=tf.float64)
# if we provide data with shape num_step x batch_size
# we can just provide time_major=True flag to dynamic RNN call
inputs_transposed = tf.transpose(inputs, [1, 0])
outputs, state = tf.nn.dynamic_rnn(
cell,
inputs_transposes,
dtype=tf.float64,
time_major=True)


## Handle last state from RNN inside graph

When using rnn usual we get last state of RNNs and send back the through feed dict:

# inside model definition
cell = tf.nn.rnn_cell.LSTMCell(num_units=n_hidden)
self.initial_state = cell.zero_state(batch_size, dtype=tf.float32)
rnn_out, self.last_state_fw = nn.dynamic_rnn(
cell=cell,
inputs=inputs,
initial_state=self.initial_state)

# and after during session
last_state = None
if last_state is not None:
feed_dict = {self.initial_state: last_state}
_, last_state = sess.run(
[self.learning_op, self.last_state],
feed_dict=feed_dict)


But in this case we move last state from GPU memory and backwards. This is unreasonable. We can handle last state inside GPU directly as:

# inside model definition
last_state = tf.Variable(tf.zeros([batch_size, n_hidden]), trainable=False)
cell = tf.nn.rnn_cell.LSTMCell(num_units=n_hidden)
rnn_out, final_states = tf.nn.dynamic_rnn(
cell=cell,
inputs=inputs,
initial_state=last_state)

# and after to assign new value to last state we should use small trick
with tf.control_dependencies([tf.assign(last_state, final_states)]):
rnn_out = tf.identity(rnn_out)


## Run model without GPU

In case you have GPUs on your machine but want to train without them, you should just pass additional env variable CUDA_VISIBLE_DEVICES=” during script call.

\$ CUDA_VISIBLE_DEVICES='' python some_model.py


## Change inline setting during training

x = some_tensor
is_training = tf.placeholder(tf.bool, shape=[])
# should define as function, because under condition should be callable
def apply_dropout(): # Function to apply when training mode ON.
return tf.nn.dropout(x, keep_prob)
# Only apply dropout at training time.
# tf.cond(cond, true_function, false_function)
new_x = tf.cond(is_training, apply_dropout, lambda: x)


## Get last output from rnn

rnn_out, last_state = tf.nn.dynamic_rnn(..)
rnn_out = tf.reverse(rnn_out, [False, True, False])
rnn_out_last = tf.slice(rnn_out, [0, 0, 0], [-1, 1, -1])


## Batch Normalization

Notes based on this paper. I think to understood BN enough just quickly pass through 3rd paragraph. At glance batch normalizaion helps training as the layer does not have to learn offsets in the input data, and can focus on how to best combine features.

It seems that when BN is used, such nuances should be considered:

If we have usual layer as $$z = g(Wu + b)$$, where $$g(.)$$ is the nonlinearity such as sigmoid or ReLU batch normalization should be applied as $$z = g(BN(Wu))$$. Note that BN applied before nonlinearity. Also due to internal shift $$\beta$$ existed in BN bias $$b$$ can be omitted.

If we apply batch norm layer from tensorflow we should clear declare param is_training=True/False during training/inference. Because for training and inference different approaches used by BN. To understood what exactly each param handled by layer mean - take a look on algorithms 1 and 2 descriptions in the original paper on pages 3 and 4 accordingly. Really is seems that it’s enough to use tf contrib layer with all default params only with redefined scale param. $$\gamma$$ (scale) and $$\beta$$ (shift) params will be trainable by default.

logits = tf.matmul(inputs, W)
normed_logits = tf.contrib.layers.batch_norm(inputs, scale=True)
output = tf.sigmoid(normed_logits)

# next lines should be added so Optimizer can find variables to optimize
update_ops = tf.get_collection(tf.GraphKeys.UPDATE_OPS)
if update_ops:


Maybe sometimes easier use in place update of alpha and beta. In docs was mentioned that this approach can be a little bit slower, but at least it less boilerplate. Also for training flag it may be conveniently to use tflearn train flags

is_training = tf.placeholder(tf.bool, shape=[])

output = tf.contrib.layers.batch_norm(
_input, scale=True, is_training=is_training,


## Applying weights regularization

# some usual loss definition as cross-entropy or MSE
initial_loss = cross_entropy
[tf.nn.l2_loss(var) for var in tf.trainable_variables()])

optimizer = tf.train.SomeOptimizer(learning_rate)
# now we should minimize sum of initial loss and regularization
train_step = optimizer.minimize(cross_entropy + l2_loss * weight_decay)


## Load part of graph from previous run

all_vars = tf.all_variables()
restored_scopes = ['Scope_1', 'Scope_2']
# get only restored variables
restored_vars = [
v for v in all_vars if v.name.split('/')[0] in restored_scopes]

# now initialize all not resotred variables
initialized_vars = [v for v in all_vars if v not in restored_vars]
sess.run(tf.variables_initializer(initialized_vars))

# also sometimes to clarify it's better to print restored variables
print("Such vars were be restored")
for v in restored_vars:
print(v.name)


## Count trainable params

total_parameters = 0
for variable in tf.trainable_variables():
shape = variable.get_shape()
variable_parametes = 1
for dim in shape:
variable_parametes *= dim.value
total_parameters += variable_parametes
print("Total training params: %.5fM" % (total_parameters / 1e6))


## Handle TensorArrays correct way inside tf.while_loop

Sometimes we want to pass output from one loop step, to next step. For this we can use tf.TensorArray with read and write operations. But in case we read and write to same tensorarray inside loop - we should manually set number of available while loop parallel_iterations=1. This is because in case of parallel loop execution(parallel_iterations > 1) some thread may try to read info from tensorArray, that was not written to it by another one thread. Try to copy/run code snippet below.

from tensorflow.examples.tutorials import mnist
# code require tensorflow verions==1.0
import tensorflow as tf

batch_size = 30
BREAK_CODE = True
if BREAK_CODE:
# fail with this settings
parallel_iterations = 10
else:
# work as expected with this settings
parallel_iterations = 1

_input = tf.placeholder(tf.float32, [batch_size, 784])
targets = tf.placeholder(tf.float32, [batch_size, 10])

input_array = tf.TensorArray(dtype=tf.float32, size=batch_size + 1)
output_array = tf.TensorArray(dtype=tf.float32, size=batch_size)
one_image = _input[0, :]
input_array = input_array.write(0, one_image)
W = tf.get_variable('W', [784, 10],
tf.float32, tf.random_uniform_initializer())
W_out = tf.get_variable("W_out", [10, 784],
tf.float32, tf.random_uniform_initializer())

def body(i, inp_array, out_array):
local_input_reshaped = tf.reshape(local_input, [1, 784])
result = tf.matmul(local_input_reshaped, W)
out_array = out_array.write(i, result)
next_input = tf.sigmoid(tf.squeeze(tf.matmul(result, W_out), axis=0))
inp_array = inp_array.write(i + 1, next_input)
return (i + 1, inp_array, out_array)

def cond(i, *args):
return i < batch_size

_, _, output_array = tf.while_loop(
cond, body, [0, input_array, output_array],
parallel_iterations=parallel_iterations)
results = output_array.stack()
results = tf.reshape(results, [batch_size, 10])

loss = tf.reduce_mean(tf.nn.softmax_cross_entropy_with_logits(
logits=results, labels=targets))

if __name__ == '__main__':
"/tmp/MNIST_data/", one_hot=True)
steps = 200
with tf.Session() as sess:
sess.run(tf.global_variables_initializer())
for i in range(steps):
batch = mnist_data.train.next_batch(batch_size)
feed_dict = {
_input: batch[0],
targets: batch[1]
}
fetches = [loss, train_op, results]
res_loss, _, res = sess.run(fetches, feed_dict=feed_dict)


## Explore checkpoints file

This can be done with such helper methods print_tensors_in_checkpoint_file and pywrap_tensorflow

from tensorflow.python.tools.inspect_checkpoint import print_tensors_in_checkpoint_file
from tensorflow.python import pywrap_tensorflow

# numpy array


## Restore part of the tensor from saving

import tensorflow as tf

# create some variables
tf.reset_default_graph()
a = tf.Variable(tf.zeros([5, 6]), name='a')
b = tf.Variable(tf.ones([5, 5]), name='b')

# initialize the variables and save them
sess = tf.InteractiveSession()
sess.run(tf.global_variables_initializer())
saver = tf.train.Saver()
tmp_checkpoint = saver.save(sess, "/tmp/model.ckpt")

# get saved variable and assign it to the value