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Introduction to the Python Deep Learning Library TensorFlow

TensorFlow is a Python library for fast numerical computing created and released by Google.

It is a foundation library that can be used to create Deep Learning models directly or by using wrapper libraries that simplify the process built on top of TensorFlow.

In this post, you will discover the TensorFlow library for Deep Learning.

  • Update Jun 2022: Update to TensorFlow 2.x

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Introduction to the Python Deep Learning Library TensorFlow

Introduction to the Python deep learning library TensorFlow
Photo by Nicolas Raymond, some rights reserved.

What Is TensorFlow?

TensorFlow is an open-source library for fast numerical computing.

It was created and is maintained by Google and was released under the Apache 2.0 open source license. The API is nominally for the Python programming language, although there is access to the underlying C++ API.

Unlike other numerical libraries intended for use in Deep Learning like Theano, TensorFlow was designed for use both in research and development and in production systems, not least of which is RankBrain in Google search and the fun DeepDream project.

It can run on single CPU systems and GPUs, as well as mobile devices and large-scale distributed systems of hundreds of machines.

How to Install TensorFlow

Installation of TensorFlow is straightforward if you already have a Python SciPy environment.

TensorFlow works with Python 3.3+. You can follow the Download and Setup instructions on the TensorFlow website. Installation is probably simplest via PyPI, and specific instructions of the pip command to use for your Linux or Mac OS X platform are on the Download and Setup webpage. In the simplest case, you just need to enter the following in your command line:

An exception would be on the newer Mac with an Apple Silicon CPU. The package name for this specific architecture is tensorflow-macos instead:

There are also virtualenv and docker images that you can use if you prefer.

To make use of the GPU, you need to have the Cuda Toolkit installed as well.

Your First Examples in TensorFlow

Computation is described in terms of data flow and operations in the structure of a directed graph.

  • Nodes: Nodes perform computation and have zero or more inputs and outputs. Data that moves between nodes are known as tensors, which are multi-dimensional arrays of real values.
  • Edges: The graph defines the flow of data, branching, looping, and updates to state. Special edges can be used to synchronize behavior within the graph, for example, waiting for computation on a number of inputs to complete.
  • Operation: An operation is a named abstract computation that can take input attributes and produce output attributes. For example, you could define an add or multiply operation.

Computation with TensorFlow

This first example is a modified version of the example on the TensorFlow website. It shows how you can define values as tensors and execute an operation.

Running this example displays:

Linear Regression with TensorFlow

This next example comes from the introduction in the TensorFlow tutorial.

This example shows how you can define variables (e.g., W and b) as well as variables that are the result of the computation (y).

We get some sense that TensorFlow separates the definition and declaration of the computation. Below, there is automatic differentiation under the hood. When we use the function mse_loss() to compute the difference between y and y_data, there is a graph created connecting the value produced by the function to the TensorFlow variables W and b. TensorFlow uses this graph to deduce how to update the variables inside the minimize() function.

Running this example prints the following output:

You can learn more about the mechanics of TensorFlow in the Basic Usage guide.

More Deep Learning Models

Your TensorFlow installation comes with a number of Deep Learning models that you can use and experiment with directly.

Firstly, you need to find out where TensorFlow was installed on your system. For example, you can use the following Python script:

For example, this could be:

Change to this directory and take note of the models subdirectory. Included are a number of deep learning models with tutorial-like comments, such as:

  • Multi-threaded word2vec mini-batched skip-gram model
  • Multi-threaded word2vec unbatched skip-gram model
  • CNN for the CIFAR-10 network
  • Simple, end-to-end, LeNet-5-like convolutional MNIST model example
  • Sequence-to-sequence model with an attention mechanism

Also, check the examples directory, which contains an example using the MNIST dataset.

There is also an excellent list of tutorials on the main TensorFlow website. They show how to use different network types and different datasets and how to use the framework in various ways.

Finally, there is the TensorFlow playground where you can experiment with small networks right in your web browser.

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TensorFlow Resources

More Resources

Summary

In this post, you discovered the TensorFlow Python library for deep learning.

You learned that it is a library for fast numerical computation, specifically designed for the types of operations required to develop and evaluate large deep learning models.

Do you have any questions about TensorFlow or this post? Ask your questions in the comments, and I will do my best to answer them.

34 Responses to Introduction to the Python Deep Learning Library TensorFlow

  1. Avatar
    Jatin November 29, 2016 at 7:33 pm #

    This was great help.

    Can you post some more tutorials using tensor-flow.

    Thanks.

  2. Avatar
    Amit Kumar February 7, 2017 at 9:58 pm #

    print sess.run(a+b) this line is syntactically incorrect. print is a method so should have an opening and closing bracket.

    • Avatar
      Jason Brownlee February 8, 2017 at 9:35 am #

      Thanks Amit, fixed.

    • Avatar
      Asesh April 20, 2017 at 5:49 pm #

      What if it’s Python 2.7? Isn’t the print statement without bracket valid?

      • Avatar
        Jason Brownlee April 21, 2017 at 8:33 am #

        The brackets are ignored/do nothing, and it makes the same code work in Python3.

  3. Avatar
    Walid Ahmed August 9, 2017 at 1:18 am #

    Hi Jason

    I could not find a models folder in my Tensorflow installation.
    Can you please help?

    • Avatar
      Jason Brownlee August 9, 2017 at 6:38 am #

      I think they have been removed from the most recent release.

  4. Avatar
    ale September 9, 2017 at 6:19 pm #

    Hi Jason

    In this page it’s written that “To make use of the GPU, only Linux is supported and it requires the Cuda Toolkit.” However, I think that Windows is also supported if Cuda toolkit and cudNN are installed. Is not it?
    Thanks.

    • Avatar
      Jason Brownlee September 11, 2017 at 12:00 pm #

      It may be, it did not appear to be the case at the time of writing.

  5. Avatar
    Trevor Wistaff April 25, 2018 at 8:37 am #

    When getting started in machine learning would you recommend ignoring Tensorflow for now sticking to your Getting Started regime?

  6. Avatar
    sagar June 29, 2018 at 6:54 pm #

    Hi Jason, I have one question with respect to Tensor flow. I am trying to implement neural style transfer, using tensor flow. Was wondering if you may have any suggestions how to correct my error below. Thank you so much.

    tf.reset_default_graph()

    sess = tf.InteractiveSession()

    sess.run(tf.initialize_all_variables())

    sess.run(model[‘input’].assign(content_image))
    Traceback (most recent call last):

    File “”, line 1, in
    sess.run(model[‘input’].assign(content_image))

    File “/Users/sherrymukim/anaconda3/lib/python3.6/site-packages/tensorflow/python/client/session.py”, line 889, in run
    run_metadata_ptr)

    File “/Users/sherrymukim/anaconda3/lib/python3.6/site-packages/tensorflow/python/client/session.py”, line 1105, in _run
    self._graph, fetches, feed_dict_tensor, feed_handles=feed_handles)

    File “/Users/sherrymukim/anaconda3/lib/python3.6/site-packages/tensorflow/python/client/session.py”, line 414, in __init__
    self._fetch_mapper = _FetchMapper.for_fetch(fetches)

    File “/Users/sherrymukim/anaconda3/lib/python3.6/site-packages/tensorflow/python/client/session.py”, line 242, in for_fetch
    return _ElementFetchMapper(fetches, contraction_fn)

    File “/Users/sherrymukim/anaconda3/lib/python3.6/site-packages/tensorflow/python/client/session.py”, line 278, in __init__
    ‘Tensor. (%s)’ % (fetch, str(e)))

    ValueError: Fetch argument cannot be interpreted as a Tensor. (Tensor Tensor(“Assign_5:0”, shape=(1, 300, 400, 3), dtype=float32_ref) is not an element of this graph.)

    • Avatar
      Jason Brownlee June 30, 2018 at 6:05 am #

      Sorry, I don’t have examples of tensorflow or style transfer. I cannot give you good advice.

      Perhaps post to stackoverflow?

  7. Avatar
    riya July 7, 2018 at 3:52 am #

    Hello,

    So, do I have to mention that the program shoulb be run on tensorflow CPU support or is it implicit when I do not have a GPU?

    Also, I am new to deep learning and all this API, CUDA, KERAS… etc are confusing. what are all this?

    Regards

    • Avatar
      Jason Brownlee July 7, 2018 at 6:19 am #

      No Keras will use TensorFlow however it is configured. TensorFlow must be configured to use the GPU and I do not cover how to do that sorry.

  8. Avatar
    Jose November 7, 2018 at 7:54 am #

    Hi Jason!
    As always, thank you for taking the time and energy in this wonderful Website!!!
    From this section of your Linear regression example:

    I get the following error:

    NameError Traceback (most recent call last)
    in
    27
    28 # Fit the line.
    —> 29 for step in xrange(201):
    30 sess.run(train)
    31 if step % 20 == 0:

    NameError: name ‘xrange’ is not defined

    • Avatar
      Jason Brownlee November 7, 2018 at 2:46 pm #

      Perhaps confirm that you have Python 2.7 or 3.5+ installed?

    • Avatar
      Carlos González February 14, 2019 at 8:16 am #

      Jose….remove “x”…just use range(201)…

  9. Avatar
    Khalil August 28, 2019 at 3:37 pm #

    I tried many times, but still the same issue, before that, I was using TensorFlow on the same PC. Just I have installed a window and tried to install again TensorFlow but getting an error.
    ImportError Traceback (most recent call last)
    ~\Miniconda3\lib\site-packages\tensorflow\python\pywrap_tensorflow.py in
    57
    —> 58 from tensorflow.python.pywrap_tensorflow_internal import *
    59 from tensorflow.python.pywrap_tensorflow_internal import __version__

    ~\Miniconda3\lib\site-packages\tensorflow\python\pywrap_tensorflow_internal.py in
    27 return _mod
    —> 28 _pywrap_tensorflow_internal = swig_import_helper()
    29 del swig_import_helper

    ~\Miniconda3\lib\site-packages\tensorflow\python\pywrap_tensorflow_internal.py in swig_import_helper()
    23 try:
    —> 24 _mod = imp.load_module(‘_pywrap_tensorflow_internal’, fp, pathname, description)
    25 finally:

    ~\Miniconda3\lib\imp.py in load_module(name, file, filename, details)
    241 else:
    –> 242 return load_dynamic(name, filename, file)
    243 elif type_ == PKG_DIRECTORY:

    ~\Miniconda3\lib\imp.py in load_dynamic(name, path, file)
    341 name=name, loader=loader, origin=path)
    –> 342 return _load(spec)
    343

    ImportError: DLL load failed: A dynamic link library (DLL) initialization routine failed.

    During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:

    ImportError Traceback (most recent call last)
    in
    —-> 1 import tensorflow as tf

    ~\Miniconda3\lib\site-packages\tensorflow\__init__.py in
    26
    27 # pylint: disable=g-bad-import-order
    —> 28 from tensorflow.python import pywrap_tensorflow # pylint: disable=unused-import
    29 from tensorflow.python.tools import module_util as _module_util
    30

    ~\Miniconda3\lib\site-packages\tensorflow\python\__init__.py in
    47 import numpy as np
    48
    —> 49 from tensorflow.python import pywrap_tensorflow
    50
    51 # Protocol buffers

    ~\Miniconda3\lib\site-packages\tensorflow\python\pywrap_tensorflow.py in
    72 for some common reasons and solutions. Include the entire stack trace
    73 above this error message when asking for help.””” % traceback.format_exc()
    —> 74 raise ImportError(msg)
    75
    76 # pylint: enable=wildcard-import,g-import-not-at-top,unused-import,line-too-long

    ImportError: Traceback (most recent call last):
    File “C:\Users\Khalil\Miniconda3\lib\site-packages\tensorflow\python\pywrap_tensorflow.py”, line 58, in
    from tensorflow.python.pywrap_tensorflow_internal import *
    File “C:\Users\Khalil\Miniconda3\lib\site-packages\tensorflow\python\pywrap_tensorflow_internal.py”, line 28, in
    _pywrap_tensorflow_internal = swig_import_helper()
    File “C:\Users\Khalil\Miniconda3\lib\site-packages\tensorflow\python\pywrap_tensorflow_internal.py”, line 24, in swig_import_helper
    _mod = imp.load_module(‘_pywrap_tensorflow_internal’, fp, pathname, description)
    File “C:\Users\Khalil\Miniconda3\lib\imp.py”, line 242, in load_module
    return load_dynamic(name, filename, file)
    File “C:\Users\Khalil\Miniconda3\lib\imp.py”, line 342, in load_dynamic
    return _load(spec)
    ImportError: DLL load failed: A dynamic link library (DLL) initialization routine failed.

    Failed to load the native TensorFlow runtime.

    See https://www.tensorflow.org/install/errors

    for some common reasons and solutions. Include the entire stack trace
    above this error message when asking for help.

  10. Avatar
    JG March 7, 2020 at 6:45 am #

    Hi Jason,

    I tried to follow this tensorflow tutorial to remember the “complex structure” of tensorflow works (tf 1.x version vs. Keras) and here are my main conclusions to troubles founded:

    1) Due to current tensorflow version it is 2.x, it is “eager executed”, so method s such as sessio() and run() are not directly available, your linear regression study case written for tensorflow 1.x, must be upgrade in the following ways:

    1.1) Or implementing under tf 2.x ‘eager executed’, I concluded that all your old code lines must be putted under a nest , such as :
    with tf.compat.v1.Session() as sess:

    in addition of updating some tensors with method: “tf.compat.v1”, for tensors in v2, such as:
    tf.compat.v1.Session()
    f.compat.v1.train.GradientDescentOptimizer(0.5)
    tf.compat.v1.global_variables_initializer()

    1.2) Or implementing tf 2.x by disabling “eager execution”, via starting your old code by the initial sentence:
    tf.compat.v1.disable_eager_execution()

    in both cases I got your same results

    1.3) Or I also tried to use directly the new methods of tf 2.x version of ‘eager training’ translating your old code such as :
    with tf.GradientTape() as tape:

    but apply to a more ‘complex structure’ such as new loss, and grad = tape.gradient(loss, w)… so I give up 🙂

    1.4) I also see that concept coming from new tensorflow 2.x is trying to apply new simple ideas of keras (wrapper such as tf.keras…) and implementing ‘eager execution’, …but now it is confusing vs. tf 1.x version …So I do not know now who is going to apply directly tensorflow under this current state …:-)

    regards,
    JG

  11. Avatar
    JG March 8, 2020 at 3:42 am #

    OK I will do it.

    Anyway I was referring to apply pure Tensorflow to research and develop ML codes… but probably there is not much advantage, if anyone, in front of using friendly keras wrapper.

  12. Avatar
    Muhammad Iqbal Bazmi Hyderabad October 13, 2020 at 3:19 am #

    Upgrade it to TensorFlow 2.0

  13. Avatar
    Krishna November 2, 2020 at 3:47 pm #

    what is the best way to be an expert in tensorflow?

  14. Avatar
    Indroneel January 19, 2022 at 10:51 pm #

    Doesn’t this example need to be update for TF2.0, I tried running it but it only ran after removing .Session() calls ?

  15. Avatar
    ahmed gamal June 17, 2022 at 3:59 am #

    can you tell me about tutorial in tensorflow and keras

  16. Avatar
    Salami Mariam July 29, 2022 at 7:22 am #

    hello can i start this course without the knowledge of python programming

    • Avatar
      James Carmichael July 29, 2022 at 10:05 am #

      Hi Salami…You certainly can start the course! You will learn Python on a practical level with deep learning as an application.

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