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Hello World

Hello World MLCube® is an example of a Docker-based MLCube.

QuickStart

Get started with MLCube Docker runner with below commands.

Create python environment

conda create -n mlcube python=3.8
conda activate mlcube

virtualenv --python=3.8 .mlcube
source .mlcube/bin/activate

Install MLCube Docker runner

pip install mlcube-docker      # Install.
mlcube config --get runners    # Check it was installed.
mlcube config --list           # Show system settings for local MLCube runners.
Depending on how your local system is configured, it may be required to change the following settings:

  • platforms.docker.docker (string): A docker executable. Examples are docker, nvidia-docker, sudo docker, podman etc.
  • platforms.docker.env_args (dictionary) and platforms.docker.build_args (dictionary). Environmental variables for docker run and build phases. Http and https proxy settings can be configured here.

A custom configuration could look like: 

platforms:
  docker:
    docker: sudo docker
    env_args:
      http_proxy: http://proxy.company.com:8088
      https_proxy: https://proxy.company.com.net:8088
    build_args:
      http_proxy: http://proxy.company.com:8088
      https_proxy: https://proxy.company.com:8088

Run Hello World MLCube example

The hello_world MLCube is part of the mlcube_examples GitHub repository: 

git clone https://github.com/mlcommons/mlcube_examples.git 
cd ./mlcube_examples/hello_world

Run Hello World MLCube on a local machine with Docker runner. Show available tasks: 

mlcube describe

Run Hello World example tasks. Very first run can take some time to download (or build) the MLCube docker image: 

# No output expected.
mlcube run --mlcube=. --task=hello --platform=docker

# No output expected.
mlcube run --mlcube=. --task=bye --platform=docker

# You should some log lines in this file.
cat ./workspace/chats/chat_with_alice.txt
If above mlcube runs fail (with the error message saying there is no docker image available, try to change the system settings file by changing platforms.docker.build_strategy to auto.

Setup Docker

MLCube Docker runner used Docker runtime, and they must be available in the system. Installation guides for various operating systems can be found here. This example was tested on a system where users are in the docker group and run docker without sudo. To add yourself to a docker group, run the following: 

# Add the docker group if it doesn't already exist.
sudo groupadd docker

# Add the connected user "${USER}" to the docker group. Change 
# the user name to match your preferred user.
sudo gpasswd -a ${USER} docker

# Restart the Docker daemon.
sudo service docker restart

# Either do a `newgrp docker` or log out/in to activate the changes to groups.
newgrp docker

Configuring Hello World MLCube

Cubes need to be configured before they can run. MLCube runners do that automatically, and users do not need to run the configure step manually. If for some reason this needs to be done, for instance, to pre-build or pull docker images (if these processes take too much time), MLCube runtime implements configure command. The Hello World cube is a Docker-based cube, and users can configure the MLCube by running the following command: 

mlcube configure --mlcube=. --platform=docker
The Docker runner will build or will pull the docker image for the Hello World cube. As it is mentioned above, this step is optional and is only required when MLCubes need to be rebuilt. This can happen when users change implementation files and want to re-package their ML project into MLCube. In other situations, MLCube runners can auto-detect if configure command needs to be run before running MLCube tasks.

Running Hello World MLCube

In order to run the Hello World cube, users need to provide the path to the root directory of the cube, platform and task names. Run the following two commands one at a time: 

cat ./workspace/chats/chat_with_alice.txt

mlcube run --mlcube=. --platform=docker --task=hello
cat ./workspace/chats/chat_with_alice.txt

mlcube run --mlcube=. --platform=docker --task=bye
cat ./workspace/chats/chat_with_alice.txt
Hello World creates a file workspace/chats/chat_with_alice.txt that contains the following: 
[2020-09-03 09:13:14.236945]  Hi, Alice! Nice to meet you.
[2020-09-03 09:13:20.749831]  Bye, Alice! It was great talking to you.

Modifying MLCube tasks

Override parameters on a command line

One way to change the parameters of MLCubes is to override them on a command line. Create a new file workspace/names/mary.txt with the following content: Mary. Then, run the following: 

mlcube run --mlcube=. --platform=docker --task=hello name=names/mary.txt chat=chats/chat_with_mary.txt
cat workspace/chats/chat_with_mary.txt

mlcube run --mlcube=. --platform=docker --task=bye name=names/mary.txt chat=chats/chat_with_mary.txt
cat workspace/chats/chat_with_mary.txt
You should observe the output similar to this one: 
[2021-09-30 18:49:46.896509]  Hi, Mary! Nice to meet you.
[2021-09-30 18:49:56.883266]  Bye, Mary! It was great talking to you.

Providing a better greeting message

Because how Hello World cube was implemented, the greeting message is always the following: Nice to meet you.. We will update the implementation so that if this is not the first time Alice says hello, the MLCube will respond: Nice to see you again..

Modify the file hello_world.py. Update the function named get_greeting_message on line 14. It should have the following implementation: 

import os

def get_greeting_message(chat_file: str) -> str:
    return "Nice to meet you." if not os.path.exists(chat_file) else "Nice to see you again."
Reconfigure the MLCube: 
mlcube configure --mlcube=. --platform=docker
And run two hello tasks again: 
rm ./workspace/chats/chat_with_alice.txt

mlcube run --mlcube=. --platform=docker --task=hello,bye
mlcube run --mlcube=. --platform=docker --task=hello,bye

cat ./workspace/chats/chat_with_alice.txt
The MLCube recognized it was not the first time it talked to Alice, and changed the greeting: 
[2021-09-30 20:04:36.977032]  Hi, Alice! Nice to meet you.
[2021-09-30 20:04:40.851157]  Bye, Alice! It was great talking to you.
[2021-09-30 20:04:47.228554]  Hi, Alice! Nice to see you again.
[2021-09-30 20:04:51.031609]  Bye, Alice! It was great talking to you.