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What is Keras and How it works? An Overview and Its Use Cases

March 8, 2022 1 Comment

History & Origin of Keras

In the Keras docs, we find: The History. history attribute is a dictionary recording training loss values and metrics values at successive epochs, as well as validation loss values and validation metrics values

When running this model, Keras maintains a so-called History object in the background. This object keeps all loss values and other metric values in memory so that they can be used in e.g. TensorBoard, in Excel reports or indeed for our own custom visualizations.

The history object is the output of the fit operation. Hence, it can be accessed in your Python script by slightly adapting that row in the above code to:

history = model.fit(X, Y, epochs=250, batch_size=1, verbose=1, validation_split=0.2)

In the Keras docs, we find:

The History.history attribute is a dictionary recording training loss values and metrics values at successive epochs, as well as validation loss values and validation metrics values (if applicable).

Keras docs on model visualization

Also add print(history) so that we can inspect the history before we visualize it, to get a feel for its structure.

It indeed outputs the model history (note that for simplicity we trained with only 5 epochs):

What is Keras ?

Keras is a high-level, deep learning API developed by Google for implementing neural networks. It is written in Python and is used to make the implementation of neural networks easy. It also supports multiple backend neural network computation.

Keras is relatively easy to learn and work with because it provides a python frontend with a high level of abstraction while having the option of multiple back-ends for computation purposes. This makes Keras slower than other deep learning frameworks, but extremely beginner-friendly.

Keras allows you to switch between different back ends. The frameworks supported by Keras are:

  • Tensorflow
  • Theano
  • PlaidML
  • MXNet
  • CNTK (Microsoft Cognitive Toolkit )

Out of these five frameworks, TensorFlow has adopted Keras as its official high-level API. Keras is embedded in TensorFlow and can be used to perform deep learning fast as it provides inbuilt modules for all neural network computations. At the same time, computation involving tensors, computation graphs, sessions, etc can be custom made using the Tensorflow Core API, which gives you total flexibility and control over your application and lets you implement your ideas in a relatively short time.

keras_backend

Keras is used for creating deep models which can be productized on smartphones. Keras is also used for distributed training of deep learning models. Keras is used by companies such as Netflix, Yelp, Uber, etc

Explain the Architecture of Keras Framework?

Keras is an Open Source Neural Network library written in Python that runs on top of Theano or TensorFlow. It is designed to be modular, fast and easy to use. Keras is high-level API wrapper for the low-level API, capable of running on top of TensorFlow, CNTK, or Theano.

Keras High-Level API handles the way we make models, defining layers, or set up multiple input-output models. In this level, Keras also compiles our model with loss and optimizer functions, training process with fit function. Keras doesn’t handle Low-Level API such as making the computational graph, making tensors or other variables as it has been handled by the “backend” engine.

Backend is a term in Keras that performs all low-level computation such as tensor products, convolutions and many other things with the help of other libraries such as TensorFlow or Theano. So, the “backend engine” will perform the computation and development of the models. TensorFlow is the default “backend engine” but we can change it in the configuration.

Use case of Keras

Keras is used for creating deep models which can be productized on smartphones. Keras is also used for distributed training of deep learning models. Keras is used by companies such as Netflix, Yelp, Uber, etc.

How to Build a Model in Keras?

The below diagram shows the basic steps involved in building a model in Keras:

building-model

Figure 3: Building a model

  1. Define a network: In this step, you define the different layers in our model and the connections between them. Keras has two main types of models: Sequential and Functional models. You choose which type of model you want and then define the dataflow between them.
  2. Compile a network: To compile code means to convert it in a form suitable for the machine to understand. In Keras, the model.compile() method performs this function. To compile the model, we define the loss function which calculates the losses in our model, the optimizer which reduces the loss, and the metrics which is used to find the accuracy of our model.
  3. Fit the network: Using this, we fit our model to our data after compiling. This is used to train the model on our data.
  4. Evaluate the network: After fitting our model, we need to evaluate the error in our model.
  5. Make Predictions: We use model.predict() to make predictions using our model on new data.

Applications of Keras

  • Keras is used for creating deep models which can be productized on smartphones.
  • Keras is also used for distributed training of deep learning models.
  • Keras is used by companies such as Netflix, Yelp, Uber, etc.
  • Keras is also extensively used in deep learning competitions to create and deploy working models, which are fast in a short amount of time.

Build deep learning models in TensorFlow and learn the TensorFlow open-source framework with the Deep Learning Course (with Keras &TensorFlow). Enroll now!

Conclusion

In this article titled ‘What is Keras? The best introductory guide to Keras’, we first answered the question, ‘What is Keras?’. We then looked at why Keras is so popular and why you should use Keras followed by the basic steps involved in making a model in Keras. We then saw a few uses of Keras.

We hope this article answered the question which was burning in the back of your mind: What is Keras? Do you have any doubts or questions for us? Mention them in this article’s comments section, and we’ll have our experts answer them for you at the earliest!

Feature and Advantage of using Keras

Advantages of Keras
  • User-Friendly and Fast Deployment. …
  • Quality Documentation and Large Community Support. …
  • Multiple Backend and Modularity. …
  • Pretrained models. …
  • Multiple GPU Support. …
  • Problems in low-level API. …
  • Need improvement in some features. …
  • Slower than its backend.

Advantages and Drawbacks of Keras

Keras is a high-level neural network API. It runs on the top of TensorFlow and Theano and is very famous in the field of Deep Learning. It is one of the best libraries used for neural networks that follows a minimalist philosophy.

Keras is very powerful and useful for beginners who are starting with Deep Learning. Before starting with Keras, it is important to know the Advantages and Drawbacks of Keras.

Best Alternative of Keras

Top 10 Alternatives to Keras
  • TFLearn.
  • NVIDIA Deep Learning GPU Training System (DIGITS)
  • Clarifai.
  • DeepPy.
  • Knet.
  • Microsoft Cognitive Toolkit (Formerly CNTK)
  • Torch.
  • RustNN.

Best Resources, Tutorials and Guide for Keras

You can use any of these courses and online training to learn deep learning, but I highly recommend you to check Deep Learning specialization on Coursera by Andrew Ng and the team. It’s by far the most comprehensive resource on deep learning.

Free Video Tutorials of Keras

Interview Questions and Answer for Keras

Q.1Explain the examples of data processing in Keras.
Some of the examples include: Firstly, neural networks don’t process raw data, like text files, encoded JPEG image files, or CSV files. They process vectorized & standardized representations. Secondly, text files need to be read into string tensors, then split into words. Finally, the words need to be indexed and turned into integer tensors. Thirdly, images need to be read and decoded into integer tensors, then converted to floating points and normalized to small values (usually between 0 and 1). Lastly, CSV data needs to be parsed, with numerical features converted to floating-point tensors and categorical features indexed and converted to integer tensors. Then each feature typically needs to be normalized to zero-mean and unit variance.
Q.2Name the types of inputs in the Keras model.
Keras models accept three types of inputs: Firstly, NumPy arrays, just like Scikit-Learn and many other Python-based libraries. This is a good option if your data fits in memory. Secondly, TensorFlow Dataset objects. This is a high-performance option that is more suitable for datasets that do not fit in memory and that are streamed from a disk or from a distributed filesystem. Lastly, Python generators that yield batches of data (such as custom subclasses of the keras.utils.Sequence class).
Q.3What is Long Short Term Memory (LSTM)? Explain its process.

LSTM’s have a Nature of Remembering information for long periods of time is their Default behavior. The LSTM had a three-step Process:

1. Forget Gate This gate Decides which information is to be omitted from the cell in that particular timestamp. It is decided by the sigmoid function. However, it looks at the previous state(ht-1) and the content input(Xt) and outputs a number between 0(omit this)and 1(keep this)for each number in the cell state Ct−1.

2. Update Gate/input gate Decides how much of this unit is added to the current state. In this, the Sigmoid function decides which values to let through 0,1. and tanh function gives weightage to the values which are passed deciding their level of importance ranging from-1 to 1.

3. Output Gate Decides which part of the current cell makes it to the output. In this, the Sigmoid function decides which values to let through 0,1. and tanh function gives weightage to the values which are passed deciding their level of importance ranging from-1 to 1 and multiplied with an output of Sigmoid.

Q.4Explain the term regularization.
Regularization is a method that makes slight modifications to the learning algorithm such that the model generalizes better. This in turn improves the model’s performance on the unseen data as well.
Q.5Name some of the regularization techniques.

The techniques are as follows:

1. L2 and L1 Regularization

2. Dropout

3. Early Stopping

4. Data Augmentation

Q.6Explain the L2 and L1 Regularization techniques.
L2 and L1 are the most common types of regularization. Regularization works on the premise that smaller weights lead to simpler models which result helps in avoiding overfitting. So to obtain a smaller weight matrix, these techniques add a ‘regularization term’ along with the loss to obtain the cost function. Here, Cost function = Loss + Regularization term However, the difference between L1 and L2 regularization techniques lies in the nature of this regularization term. In general, the addition of this regularization term causes the values of the weight matrices to reduce, leading to simpler models.
Q.7What do you understand about Dropout and early stopping techniques?
Dropout means that during the training, randomly selected neurons are turned off or ‘dropped’ out. It means that they are temporarily obstructed from influencing or activating the downward neuron in a forward pass, and none of the weights updates is applied on the backward pass. Whereas Early Stopping is a kind of cross-validation strategy where one part of the training set is used as a validation set, and the performance of the model is gauged against this set. So if the performance on this validation set gets worse, the training on the model is immediately stopped. However, the main idea behind this technique is that while fitting a neural network on training data, consecutively, the model is evaluated on the unseen data or the validation set after each iteration. So if the performance on this validation set is decreasing or remaining the same for certain iterations, then the process of model training is stopped.
Q.8What is Convolutional Neural Network?
A Convolutional Neural Network (ConvNet/CNN) is a Deep Learning algorithm that can take in an input image, assign importance to various aspects/objects in the image and be able to differentiate one from the other. The pre-processing required in a ConvNet is much lower as compared to other classification algorithms. While in primitive methods filters are hand-engineered, with enough training, ConvNets have the ability to learn these filters/characteristics.
Q.9Explain the process of training a CNN.

The process for training a CNN for classifying images consists of the following steps −

1. Data Preparation In this step, we center-crop the images and resize them so that all images for training and testing would be of the same size. This is usually done by running a small Python script on the image data.

2. Model Definition In this step, we define a CNN architecture. The configuration is stored in .pb (protobuf) file.

3. Solver Definition In this, we define the solver configuration file. The solver does the model optimization.

4. Model Training In this, we use the built-in Caffe utility to train the model. The training may take a considerable amount of time and CPU usage. After the training is completed, Caffe stores the model in a file, which can, later on, be used on test data and final deployment for predictions.

Q.10What do you know about Data preprocessing with Keras?
Once your data is in the form of string/int/float NumpPy arrays, or a Dataset object (or Python generator) that yields batches of string/int/float tensors, it is time to preprocess the data. This can mean: Firstly, Tokenization of string data, followed by token indexing. Secondly, Feature normalization. Thirdly, Rescaling the data to small values. In general, input values to a neural network should be close to zero — typically we expect either data with zero-mean and unit-variance, or data in the [0, 1] range.

 

Rajesh Kumar
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joaquin
joaquin
2 years ago

Thank you for writing such an informative and interesting article.

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