yeandy commented on code in PR #22250:
URL: https://github.com/apache/beam/pull/22250#discussion_r919980966


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+---
+type: languages
+title: "Apache Beam Python Machine Learning"
+---
+<!--
+Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+You may obtain a copy of the License at
+
+http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+
+Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+limitations under the License.
+-->
+
+# Machine Learning
+
+You can use Apache Beam with the RunInference API to use machine learning (ML) 
models to do local and remote inference with batch and streaming pipelines. 
Starting with Apache Beam 2.40.0, PyTorch and Scikit-learn frameworks are 
supported. You can create multiple types of transforms using the RunInference 
API: the API takes multiple types of setup parameters from model handlers, and 
the parameter type determines the model implementation.
+
+## Why use the RunInference API?
+
+RunInference leverages existing Apache Beam concepts, such as the the 
`BatchElements` transform and the `Shared` class, and it allows you to build 
multi-model pipelines. In addition, the RunInference API has built in 
capabilities for dealing with [keyed 
values](#use-the-prediction-results-object).
+
+### BatchElements PTransform
+
+To take advantage of the optimizations of vectorized inference that many 
models implement, we added the `BatchElements` transform as an intermediate 
step before making the prediction for the model. This transform batches 
elements together. The resulting batch is used to make the appropriate 
transformation for the particular framework of RunInference. For example, for 
numpy `ndarrays`, we call `numpy.stack()`,  and for torch `Tensor` elements, we 
call `torch.stack()`.
+
+To customize the settings for `beam.BatchElements`, in `ModelHandler`, 
override the `batch_elements_kwargs` function. For example, use 
`min_batch_size` to set the lowest number of elements per batch or 
`max_batch_size` to set the highest number of elements per batch.
+
+For more information, see the [`BatchElements` transform 
documentation](https://beam.apache.org/releases/pydoc/current/apache_beam.transforms.util.html#apache_beam.transforms.util.BatchElements).
+
+### Shared helper class
+
+Instead of loading a model for each thread in the process, we use the `Shared` 
class, which allows us to load one model that is shared across all threads of 
each worker in a DoFn. For more information, see the
+[`Shared` class 
documentation](https://github.com/apache/beam/blob/master/sdks/python/apache_beam/utils/shared.py#L20).
+
+### Multi-model pipelines
+
+The RunInference API can be composed into multi-model pipelines. Multi-model 
pipelines are useful for A/B testing and for building out ensembles for 
tokenization, sentence segmentation, part-of-speech tagging, named entity 
extraction, language detection, coreference resolution, and more.
+
+### Prediction results
+
+When doing a prediction in Apache Beam, the output `PCollection` includes both 
the keys of the input examples and the inferences. Including both these items 
in the output allows you to find the input that determined the predictions 
without returning the full input data.
+
+For more information, see the [`PredictionResult` 
documentation](https://github.com/apache/beam/blob/master/sdks/python/apache_beam/ml/inference/base.py#L65).
 
+
+## Modify a pipeline to use an ML model
+
+To use the RunInference transform, you add a single line of code in your 
pipeline:
+
+```
+from apache_beam.ml.inference.base import RunInference
+ 
+with pipeline as p:
+   predictions = ( p | beam.ReadFromSource('a_source')   
+    | RunInference(configuration)))
+```
+
+To import models, you need to wrap them around a `ModelHandler object`. Add 
one or more of the following lines of code, depending on the framework and type 
of data structure that holds the data:
+
+```
+from apache_beam.ml.inference.pytorch_inference import SklearnModelHandlerNumpy
+```
+```
+from apache_beam.ml.inference.pytorch_inference import 
PytorchModelHandlerTensor
+```
+```
+from apache_beam.ml.inference.pytorch_inference import 
SklearnModelHandlerPandas
+```
+```
+from apache_beam.ml.inference.pytorch_inference import 
PytorchModelHandlerKeyedTensor
+```
+### Use pre-trained models
+
+You need to provide a path to the model weights that's accessible by the 
pipeline. To use pre-trained models with the RunInference API and the PyTorch 
framework, complete the following steps:
+
+1. Download the pre-trained weights and host them in a location that the 
pipeline can access.
+2. Pass the hosted path of the model to the PyTorch `model_handler` by using 
the following code: `state_dict_path=<path_to_weights>`.
+
+### Use multiple inference models
+
+You can also use the RunInference transform to add multiple inference models 
to your pipeline.
+
+#### A/B Pattern
+
+```
+with pipeline as p:
+   data = p | 'Read' >> beam.ReadFromSource('a_source') 
+   model_a_predictions = data | RunInference(ModelHandlerA)
+   model_b_predictions = data | RunInference(ModelHandlerB)
+```
+
+#### Ensemble Pattern
+
+```
+with pipeline as p:
+   data = p | 'Read' >> beam.ReadFromSource('a_source') 
+   model_a_predictions = data | RunInference(ModelHandlerA)
+   model_b_predictions = model_a_predictions | beam.Map(some_post_processing) 
| RunInference(ModelHandlerB)
+```
+
+### Use a key handler
+
+If a key is attached to the examples, use the `KeyedModelHandler`:
+
+```
+from apache_beam.ml.inference.base import KeyedModelHandler
+ 
+keyed_model_handler = KeyedModelHandler(PytorchModelHandlerTensor(...))
+ 
+with pipeline as p:
+   data = p | beam.Create([
+      ('img1', np.array[[1,2,3],[4,5,6],...]),
+      ('img2', np.array[[1,2,3],[4,5,6],...]),
+      ('img3', np.array[[1,2,3],[4,5,6],...]),
+   ])
+   predictions = data | RunInference(keyed_model_handler)
+```
+
+### Use the prediction results object
+
+The `PredictionResult` is a `NamedTuple` object that contains both the input 
and the inferences, named  `example` and  `inference`, respectively. Your 
pipeline interacts with a `PredictionResult` object in steps after the 
RunInference transform.
+
+```
+class PostProcessor(beam.DoFn):
+    def process(self, element: Tuple[str, PredictionResult]):
+       key, prediction_result = element
+       inputs = prediction_result.example
+       predictions = prediction_result.inference
+
+       # Post-processing logic
+       result = ...
+
+       yield (key, result)
+
+with pipeline as p:
+    output = (
+        p | 'Read' >> beam.ReadFromSource('a_source') 
+                | 'PyTorchRunInference' >> RunInference(KeyedModelHandler)
+                | 'ProcessOutput' >> beam.ParDo(PostProcessor()))
+```
+
+If you need to use this object explicitly, include the following line in your 
pipeline to import the object:
+
+```
+from apache_beam.ml.inference.base import PredictionResult
+```
+
+## Run a machine learning pipeline
+
+For detailed instructions explaining how to build and run a pipeline that uses 
ML models, see the
+[Example RunInference API 
pipelines](https://github.com/apache/beam/tree/master/sdks/python/apache_beam/examples/inference)
 on GitHub.
+
+## Troubleshooting
+
+If you run into problems with your pipeline or job, this section lists issues 
that you might encounter and provides suggestions for how to fix them.
+
+### Prediction results missing
+
+When you use a dictionary of tensors, the output might not include the 
prediction results. This issue occurs because the RunInference API supports 
tensors but not dictionaries of tensors. 
+
+Many model inferences return a dictionary with the predictions and additional 
metadata, for example, `Dict[str, Tensor]`. The RunInference API currently 
expects outputs to be an `Iterable[Any]`, for example, `Iterable[Tensor]` or 
`Iterable[Dict[str, Tensor]]`.
+
+When RunInference zips the inputs with the predictions, the predictions 
iterate over the dictionary keys instead of the batch elements. The result is 
that the key name is preserved but the prediction tensors are discarded. For 
more information, see the [Pytorch RunInference PredictionResult is a 
Dict](https://github.com/apache/beam/issues/22240) issue in the Apache Beam 
GitHub project.
+
+To work with current RunInference implementation, override the `forward()` 
function and convert the standard Hugging Face forward output into the 
appropriate format of `List[Dict[str, torch.Tensor]]`. For more information, 
see an [example with the batching flag 
added](https://github.com/apache/beam/blob/master/sdks/python/apache_beam/examples/inference/pytorch_language_modeling.py#L49).
+
+### Unable to batch tensor elements
+
+RunInference uses dynamic batching. However, the RunInference API cannot batch 
tensor elements of different sizes, because `torch.stack()` expects tensors of 
the same length. If you provide images of different sizes or word embeddings of 
different lengths, errors might occur.
+
+To avoid this issue:
+
+1. Either use elements that have the same size, or resize image inputs and 
word embeddings to make them 
+the same size. Depending on the language model and encoding technique, this 
option might not be available. 

Review Comment:
   ```suggestion
   the same size. For NLP use cases, this might not be possible to do with text 
of varying lengths.
   ```



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