A Higher Level API to BigML.io, the public BigML API
Project description
BigMLer - A Higher-Level API to BigML’s API
BigMLer makes BigML even easier.
BigMLer wraps BigML’s API Python bindings to offer a high-level command-line script to easily create and publish datasets and models, create ensembles, make local predictions from multiple models, and simplify many other machine learning tasks.
BigMLer is open sourced under the Apache License, Version 2.0.
Support
Please report problems and bugs to our BigML.io issue tracker.
Discussions about the different bindings take place in the general BigML mailing list. Or join us in our Campfire chatroom.
Requirements
Python 2.7 is currently supported by BigMLer.
BigMLer requires bigml 0.7.1 or higher.
BigMLer Installation
To install the latest stable release with pip:
$ pip install bigmler
You can also install the development version of bigmler directly from the Git repository:
$ pip install -e git://github.com/bigmlcom/bigmler.git#egg=bigmler
BigML Authentication
All the requests to BigML.io must be authenticated using your username and API key and are always transmitted over HTTPS.
BigML module will look for your username and API key in the environment variables BIGML_USERNAME and BIGML_API_KEY respectively. You can add the following lines to your .bashrc or .bash_profile to set those variables automatically when you log in:
export BIGML_USERNAME=myusername export BIGML_API_KEY=ae579e7e53fb9abd646a6ff8aa99d4afe83ac291
Otherwise, you can initialize directly when running the BigMLer script as follows:
bigmler --train data/iris.csv --username myusername --api_key ae579e7e53fb9abd646a6ff8aa99d4afe83ac291
BigML Development Mode
Also, you can instruct BigMLer to work in BigML’s Sandbox environment by using the parameter ---dev:
bigmler --train data/iris.csv --dev
Using the development flag you can run tasks under 1 MB without spending any of your BigML credits.
Using BigMLer
To run BigMLer you can use the console script directly. The –help option will describe all the available options:
bigmler --help
Alternatively you can just call bigmler as follows:
python bigmler.py --help
This will display the full list of optional arguments. You can read a brief explanation for each option below.
Quick Start
Let’s see some basic usage examples. Check the installation and authentication sections in BigMLer on Read the Docs if you are not familiar with BigML.
Basics
You can create a new model just with
bigmler --train data/iris.csv
If you check your dashboard at BigML, you will see a new source, dataset, and model. Isn’t it magic?
You can generate predictions for a test set using:
bigmler --train data/iris.csv --test data/test_iris.csv
You can also specify a file name to save the newly created predictions:
bigmler --train data/iris.csv --test data/test_iris.csv --output predictions
If you do not specify the path to an output file, BigMLer will auto-generate one for you under a new directory named after the current date and time (e.g., MonNov1212_174715/predictions.csv). With --predictions-info flag set to brief only the prediction result will be stored (default is normal and includes confidence information).
A different objective field (the field that you want to predict) can be selected using:
bigmler --train data/iris.csv --test data/test_iris.csv --objective 'sepal length'
If you do not explicitly specify an objective field, BigML will default to the last column in your dataset.
BigMLer will try to use the locale of the model both to create a new source (if --train flag is used) and to interpret test data. In case it fails, it will try en_US.UTF-8 or English_United States.1252 and a warning message will be printed. If you want to change this behaviour you can specify your preferred locale:
bigmler --train data/iris.csv --test data/test_iris.csv \ --locale "English_United States.1252"
If you check your working directory you will see that BigMLer creates a file with the model ids that have been generated (e.g., FriNov0912_223645/models). This file is handy if then you want to use those model ids to generate local predictions. BigMLer also creates a file with the dataset id that has been generated (e.g., TueNov1312_003451/dataset) and another one summarizing the steps taken in the session progress: bigmler_sessions. You can also store a copy of every created or retrieved resource in your output directory (e.g., TueNov1312_003451/model_50c23e5e035d07305a00004f) by setting the flag --store.
Prior Versions Compatibility Issues
BigMLer will accept flags written with underscore as word separator like --clear_logs for compatibility with prior versions. Also --field-names is accepted, although the more complete --field-attributes flag is preferred. --stat_pruning and --no_stat_pruning are discontinued and their effects can be achived by setting the actual --pruning flag to statistical or no-pruning values respectively.
Additional Information
For additional information, see the full documentation for BigMLer on Read the Docs.
History
0.3.2 (2013-07-04)
Adding new flag to control predictions file information
Bug fixing: using default sample-rate in ensemble evaluations
Adding standard deviation to evaluation measures in cross-validation
Bug fixing: using only-model argument to download fields in models
0.3.1 (2013-05-14)
Adding delete for ensembles
Creating ensembles when the number of models is greater than one
Remote predictions using ensembles
0.3.0 (2013-04-30)
Adding cross-validation feature
Using user locale to create new resources in BigML
Adding –ensemble flag to use ensembles in predictions and evaluations
0.2.1 (2013-03-03)
Deep refactoring of main resources management
Fixing bug in batch_predict for no headers test sets
Fixing bug for wide dataset’s models than need query-string to retrieve all fields
Fixing bug in test asserts to catch subprocess raise
Adding default missing tokens to models
Adding stdin input for –train flag
Fixing bug when reading descriptions in –field-attributes
Refactoring to get status from api function
Adding confidence to combined predictions
0.2.0 (2012-01-21)
Evaluations management
console monitoring of process advance
resume option
user defaults
Refactoring to improve readability
0.1.4 (2012-12-21)
Improved locale management.
Adds progressive handling for large numbers of models.
More options in field attributes update feature.
New flag to combine local existing predictions.
More methods in local predictions: plurality, confidence weighted.
0.1.3 (2012-12-06)
New flag for locale settings configuration.
Filtering only finished resources.
0.1.2 (2012-12-06)
Fix to ensure windows compatibility.
0.1.1 (2012-11-07)
Initial release.
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