Highlights

• MKL-DNN support enhancement, which includes training optimization, more models training support and model serialization support
• A new distributed optimizer for models powered by MKL-DNN. This optimizer can overlap training and communication during the distributed training, which lead to a better scalability on multi-nodes

Details

• [New Feature] A new optim method ParallelAdam which leverages the multi-thread capacity
• [New Feature] Add new validation methods HitRate, which is widely used in recommendation
• [New Feature] Add new validation methods NDCG, which is widely used in recommendation
• [New Feature] Support communication priority when synchronize parameter in the distributed training
• [New Feature] Support ModelBroadcast customization
• [New Feature] Add a new distributed optimizer for models powered by MKL-DNN. This optimizer can overlap training and communication during the distributed training, which lead to a better scalability on multi-nodes
• [API Change] Add batch size into the Python model.predict API
• [Enhancement] Add MKL-DNN training example for LeNet
• [Enhancement] Improve the training performance by getting rid of narrowing gradients and zero gradients for model powered by MKL-DNN
• [Enhancement] Add training example for VGG-16 based on MKL-DNN
• [Enhancement] Support nested table in Graph output
• [Enhancement] Enhancement on thread pool to make it compatible with MKL-DNN engine
• [Enhancement] MKL-DNN model serialization support
• [Enhancement] Add VGG-16 validation example
• [Bug Fix] Fix JoinTable throwing exception during backward if batch size is changed
• [Bug Fix] Change Reshape to InferReShape in ReshapeLoadTF
• [Bug Fix] Fix splitBatch issue in Predictor, where the model has multiple Graph and each Graph outputs a table
• [Bug Fix] Fix MDL-DNN inference performance issue not to copy weights at inference
• [Bug Fix] Fix the issue that the training will crash if there are unlabeled data
• [Bug Fix] Fix the issue that the input is grey image while the model needs 3 channels input
• [Bug Fix] Correct the style check job to make both input and output file format to UTF-8 format
• [Bug Fix] Load the relevant library only if MKL-DNN engine specified
• [Bug Fix] Shade org.tensorflow.framework to avoid conflict
• [Bug Fix] Fix dlframes not packaged in pip issue
• [Bug Fix] Fix LocalPredictor cannot be serialized because of nested logger variable
• [Bug Fix] Need to clear Recurrent preTopology's output while cloneCells
• [Bug Fix] MM layer output different output for same input if ran multiple times
• [Bug Fix] Distribute predictor will send model twice when do mapPartition
• [Document] Kubernetes programming guide to spark2.3
• [Document] Add document for wrap preprocessor and model in one graph and add its python API