model_format.html



<!DOCTYPE html>
<!--[if IE 8]><html class="no-js lt-ie9" lang="en" > <![endif]-->
<!--[if gt IE 8]><!--> <html class="no-js" lang="en" > <!--<![endif]-->
<head>
  <meta charset="utf-8">
  
  <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0">
  
  <title>Design Doc: Model Format &mdash; PaddlePaddle  文档</title>
  

    <link rel="stylesheet" href="../_static/css/theme.css" type="text/css" />
  

        <link rel="index" title="索引"
              href="../genindex.html"/>
        <link rel="search" title="搜索" href="../search.html"/>
    <link rel="top" title="PaddlePaddle  文档" href="../index.html"/> 

  <link rel="stylesheet" href="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/perfect-scrollbar/0.6.14/css/perfect-scrollbar.min.css" type="text/css" />
  <link rel="stylesheet" href="../_static/css/override.css" type="text/css" />
  <script>
  var _hmt = _hmt || [];
  (function() {
    var hm = document.createElement("script");
    hm.src = "//hm.baidu.com/hm.js?b9a314ab40d04d805655aab1deee08ba";
    var s = document.getElementsByTagName("script")[0]; 
    s.parentNode.insertBefore(hm, s);
  })();
  </script>

  
  <script src="../_static/js/modernizr.min.js"></script>

</head>

<body class="wy-body-for-nav" role="document">

  
  <header class="site-header">
    <div class="site-logo">
      <a href="/"><img src="../_static/images/PP_w.png"></a>
    </div>
    <div class="site-nav-links">
      <div class="site-menu">
        <a class="fork-on-github" href="https://github.com/PaddlePaddle/Paddle" target="_blank"><i class="fa fa-github"></i>Fork me on Github</a>
        <div class="language-switcher dropdown">
          <a type="button" data-toggle="dropdown">
            <span>English</span>
            <i class="fa fa-angle-up"></i>
            <i class="fa fa-angle-down"></i>
          </a>
          <ul class="dropdown-menu">
            <li><a href="/doc_cn">中文</a></li>
            <li><a href="/doc">English</a></li>
          </ul>
        </div>
        <ul class="site-page-links">
          <li><a href="/">Home</a></li>
        </ul>
      </div>
      <div class="doc-module">
        
        <ul>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="../getstarted/index_cn.html">新手入门</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/index_cn.html">进阶指南</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="../api/index_cn.html">API</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="../faq/index_cn.html">FAQ</a></li>
</ul>

        
<div role="search">
  <form id="rtd-search-form" class="wy-form" action="../search.html" method="get">
    <input type="text" name="q" placeholder="Search docs" />
    <input type="hidden" name="check_keywords" value="yes" />
    <input type="hidden" name="area" value="default" />
  </form>
</div>        
      </div>
    </div>
  </header>
  
  <div class="main-content-wrap">

    
    <nav class="doc-menu-vertical" role="navigation">
        
          
          <ul>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="../getstarted/index_cn.html">新手入门</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../getstarted/build_and_install/index_cn.html">安装与编译</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="../getstarted/build_and_install/docker_install_cn.html">PaddlePaddle的Docker容器使用方式</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="../getstarted/build_and_install/cmake/build_from_source_cn.html">PaddlePaddle的编译选项</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../getstarted/concepts/use_concepts_cn.html">基本使用概念</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/index_cn.html">进阶指南</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/usage/cmd_parameter/index_cn.html">设置命令行参数</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/usage/cmd_parameter/use_case_cn.html">使用案例</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/usage/cmd_parameter/arguments_cn.html">参数概述</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/usage/cmd_parameter/detail_introduction_cn.html">细节描述</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/usage/cluster/cluster_train_cn.html">PaddlePaddle分布式训练</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/usage/k8s/k8s_basis_cn.html">Kubernetes 简介</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/usage/k8s/k8s_cn.html">Kubernetes单机训练</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/usage/k8s/k8s_distributed_cn.html">Kubernetes分布式训练</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/dev/build_cn.html">编译PaddlePaddle和运行单元测试</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/dev/write_docs_cn.html">如何贡献/修改文档</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/deep_model/rnn/index_cn.html">RNN相关模型</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/deep_model/rnn/rnn_config_cn.html">RNN配置</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/deep_model/rnn/recurrent_group_cn.html">Recurrent Group教程</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/deep_model/rnn/hierarchical_layer_cn.html">支持双层序列作为输入的Layer</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/deep_model/rnn/hrnn_rnn_api_compare_cn.html">单双层RNN API对比介绍</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../howto/optimization/gpu_profiling_cn.html">GPU性能分析与调优</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="../api/index_cn.html">API</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../api/v2/model_configs.html">模型配置</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="../api/v2/config/activation.html">Activation</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="../api/v2/config/layer.html">Layers</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="../api/v2/config/evaluators.html">Evaluators</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="../api/v2/config/optimizer.html">Optimizer</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="../api/v2/config/pooling.html">Pooling</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="../api/v2/config/networks.html">Networks</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l3"><a class="reference internal" href="../api/v2/config/attr.html">Parameter Attribute</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../api/v2/data.html">数据访问</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../api/v2/run_logic.html">训练与应用</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
<li class="toctree-l1"><a class="reference internal" href="../faq/index_cn.html">FAQ</a><ul>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../faq/build_and_install/index_cn.html">编译安装与单元测试</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../faq/model/index_cn.html">模型配置</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../faq/parameter/index_cn.html">参数设置</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../faq/local/index_cn.html">本地训练与预测</a></li>
<li class="toctree-l2"><a class="reference internal" href="../faq/cluster/index_cn.html">集群训练与预测</a></li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>

        
    </nav>
    
    <section class="doc-content-wrap">

      
<div role="navigation" aria-label="breadcrumbs navigation">
  <ul class="wy-breadcrumbs">
      
    <li>Design Doc: Model Format</li>
  </ul>
</div>
      
      <div class="wy-nav-content" id="doc-content">
        <div class="rst-content">
          <div role="main" class="document" itemscope="itemscope" itemtype="http://schema.org/Article">
           <div itemprop="articleBody">
            
  <div class="section" id="design-doc-model-format">
<span id="design-doc-model-format"></span><h1>Design Doc: Model Format<a class="headerlink" href="#design-doc-model-format" title="永久链接至标题">¶</a></h1>
<div class="section" id="motivation">
<span id="motivation"></span><h2>Motivation<a class="headerlink" href="#motivation" title="永久链接至标题">¶</a></h2>
<p>A model is an output of the training process. One complete model consists of two parts, the <strong>topology</strong> and the <strong>parameters</strong>. In order to support industrial deployment, the model format must be self-complete and must not expose any training source code.</p>
<p>As a result, In PaddlePaddle, the <strong>topology</strong> is represented as a  <a class="reference external" href="https://github.com/PaddlePaddle/Paddle/blob/1c0a4c901c9fc881d120249c703b15d1c50dae7d/doc/design/program.md">ProgramDesc</a>, which describes the model structure. The <strong>parameters</strong> contain all the trainable weights in the model. We must support large size parameters and efficient serialization/deserialization of parameters.</p>
</div>
<div class="section" id="implementation">
<span id="implementation"></span><h2>Implementation<a class="headerlink" href="#implementation" title="永久链接至标题">¶</a></h2>
<p>The topology is saved as a plain text in a detailed self-contain protobuf file.</p>
<p>The parameters are saved as a binary file. As we all know, the protobuf message has a limit of <a class="reference external" href="https://developers.google.com/protocol-buffers/docs/reference/cpp/google.protobuf.io.coded_stream#CodedInputStream.SetTotalBytesLimit.details">64M size</a>. We have done a <a class="reference external" href="https://github.com/PaddlePaddle/Paddle/pull/4610">benchmark experiment</a>, which shows that protobuf is not fit for the task.</p>
<p>As a result, we design a particular format for tensor serialization. By default, an arbitrary tensor in Paddle is a <a class="reference external" href="https://github.com/PaddlePaddle/Paddle/blob/develop/paddle/framework/lod_tensor.md">LoDTensor</a>, and has a description information proto of <a class="reference external" href="https://github.com/PaddlePaddle/Paddle/blob/develop/paddle/framework/framework.proto#L99">LoDTensorDesc</a>. We save the DescProto as the byte string header. It contains all the necessary information, such as the <code class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">dims</span></code>, and the <code class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">LoD</span></code> information in <a class="reference external" href="https://github.com/PaddlePaddle/Paddle/blob/1c0a4c901c9fc881d120249c703b15d1c50dae7d/paddle/framework/lod_tensor.md">LoDTensor</a>. A tensor stores values in a continuous memory buffer. For speed we dump the raw memory to disk and save it as the byte string content. So, the binary format of one tensor is,</p>
<p>The table below shows a tensor&#8217;s byte view in detail. Note that all the signed values are written in the little-endian format.</p>
<p>|field name  | type | description |
| &#8212; | &#8212; | &#8212; |
| version | uint32_t | Version of saved file. Always 0 now. |
| tensor desc length | uint32_t | TensorDesc(Protobuf message) length in bytes. |
| tensor desc | void* | TensorDesc protobuf binary message |
| tensor data | void* | Tensor&#8217;s data in binary format. The length of <code class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">tensor_data</span></code> is decided by <code class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">TensorDesc.dims()</span></code> and <code class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">TensorDesc.data_type()</span></code> |
| lod_level | uint64_t | Level of LoD |
| length of lod[0] | uint64_t | [Optional] length of lod[0] in bytes. |
| data of lod[0] | uint64_t*  | [Optional] lod[0].data() |
| ... | ... | ... |</p>
</div>
<div class="section" id="summary">
<span id="summary"></span><h2>Summary<a class="headerlink" href="#summary" title="永久链接至标题">¶</a></h2>
<ul class="simple">
<li>We introduce a model format.</li>
<li>The model represented by its forward-pass computation procedure is saved in a <strong>ProgramDesc</strong> protobuf message.</li>
<li>A bunch of specified format binary tensors describe the <strong>parameters</strong>.</li>
</ul>
</div>
</div>


           </div>
          </div>
          <footer>
  

  <hr/>

  <div role="contentinfo">
    <p>
        &copy; Copyright 2016, PaddlePaddle developers.

    </p>
  </div>
  Built with <a href="http://sphinx-doc.org/">Sphinx</a> using a <a href="https://github.com/snide/sphinx_rtd_theme">theme</a> provided by <a href="https://readthedocs.org">Read the Docs</a>. 

</footer>

        </div>
      </div>

    </section>

  </div>
  

    <script type="text/javascript">
        var DOCUMENTATION_OPTIONS = {
            URL_ROOT:'../',
            VERSION:'',
            COLLAPSE_INDEX:false,
            FILE_SUFFIX:'.html',
            HAS_SOURCE:  true,
            SOURCELINK_SUFFIX: ".txt",
        };
    </script>
      <script type="text/javascript" src="../_static/jquery.js"></script>
      <script type="text/javascript" src="../_static/underscore.js"></script>
      <script type="text/javascript" src="../_static/doctools.js"></script>
      <script type="text/javascript" src="../_static/translations.js"></script>
      <script type="text/javascript" src="https://cdn.bootcss.com/mathjax/2.7.0/MathJax.js"></script>
       
  
    <script type="text/javascript" src="../_static/js/theme.js"></script>
  
  
  <script src="https://maxcdn.bootstrapcdn.com/bootstrap/3.3.7/js/bootstrap.min.js" integrity="sha384-Tc5IQib027qvyjSMfHjOMaLkfuWVxZxUPnCJA7l2mCWNIpG9mGCD8wGNIcPD7Txa" crossorigin="anonymous"></script>
  <script src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/perfect-scrollbar/0.6.14/js/perfect-scrollbar.jquery.min.js"></script>
  <script src="../_static/js/paddle_doc_init.js"></script> 

</body>
</html>