Machine Learning on Cloud

According to Microsoft:

Machine learning is a data science technique that allows computers to use existing data to forecast
future behaviors, outcomes, and trends.web

As you move forward, you will learn how to use Azure Machine Learning Studio as an integrated,
end-to-end data science and advanced analytics solution, enabling data scientists to prepare data,
develop experiments, and deploy models at cloud scale.

How Does it Work?

(1) Azure Machine Learning Studio is a cloud service in Azure that enables you to
experiment with data and create predictive models.
(2) An Experimental Dataset is taken and a workflow of transformations to apply to
the data are defined.
(3) Different models are trained and tested to create a predictive experiment model
with required accuracy.
(4) The predictive experiment encapsulates the machine learning model and the
associated data transformations, ready to be used with new data.
(5) Your predictive experiment can then be published as a web service, which
client applications and processes can call to generate predicted values.

What is it Based on?

Azure Machine Learning is built on top of:

 Jupyter Notebook
 Apache Spark
 Docker
 Kubernetes
 Python
 Conda
 Microsoft Machine Learning Library for Apache Spark
 Microsoft Cognitive Toolkit.

Azure ML is compatible with scikit-learn, TensorFlow and Spark ML

How the Components Work Together?
 Python and Jupyter Notebook together provide the basic scripting capabilities
in the Azure ML Studio.
 Conda acts as a package manager for compatible python packages like sckit-
learn, matplotlib, TensorFlow, etc...
 Docker and Kubernetes provide the underlying environment for the
webservice deployment.
 Apache Spark and the Dependant Libraries help in Data gathering from Big
Data Jobs which can be linked with the Azure ML Studio.
 Apart from these underlying components Azure ML Studio can further be
connected to services such as Azure Storage, Azure SQL Storage, etc..
facilitating a single environment for the whole Data Science life-cycle.
Other ML Tools
In addition to Azure Machine Learning Studio, there are a variety of options at
Microsoft to build, deploy, and manage your machine learning models.
 Machine Learning Service
 SQL Server Machine Learning Services
 Microsoft Machine Learning Server
 Azure Data Science Virtual Machine
 Spark MLLib in HDInsight
 Batch AI Training Service
 Microsoft Cognitive Toolkit (CNTK)
 Azure Cognitive Services

Machine Learning Service

Closely related to Machine Learning Studio, Machine Learning Service is an offering in Azure from
Microsoft which provides the utility similar to Azure ML Studio.

It is currently in preview and provides the environment with much better support to open
frameworks in python such as Tensorflow, sci-kit learn etc..

It supports Jupyter Notebooks, Visual Studio Code Tools for AI, Azure Batch AI and Containerised
Deployment.

ML Service vs Azure ML Studio

When compared with the Machine Learning Service, Azure Machine Learning Studio
provides pre-configured algorithms and a drag-drop interface for ML.
Azure ML Studio is recommended for beginners to Experiment with ML modelling
and deployment and for small-scale, low complexity business problems.
However, Machine Learning Service provides a professional and full-fledged
environment for solving complex business problems and handle global scale cloud
deployment of services.
Moving Forward

As you move forward with the course, you will learn

How to interact with Azure ML on the web.

Use Azure ML functionality to clean data, create ML models and deploy them as web services.

Consume the web services in real-time client applications.

Re-train models using Azure Big data factory.

Using Azure ML for IoT and Big data Applications.

Azure ML Platform

This helps understand using Azure ML platform on the web to generate predictions by creating and
deploying ML models.

The workflow followed to generate web services from datasets is as follows:

Train a Machine Learning Model with training Experiment.

Create a Predictive experiment from training experiment encapsulating data transformations and
training model.

Use the Predictive experiment to create a web service to generate predictions using API-endpoint
and API key.

Cortana Intelligence Gallery

The Cortana Intelligence Gallery is a collection of resources people have shared on the Azure ML
platform.

It includes various tutorials, datasets and experiments.

Experiments can be copied from the gallery into a workspace and can be explored/modified for a
better understanding.

We can also share our work on experiments and web services for others to learn and explore.

Move to the next topic to start creating and experimenting on ML models.

Datasets

An Azure ML experiment requires at least one dataset on which the model is created. The data can
be imported directly or into Azure Storage and used for creating a model.

Generally, in the case of Big Data Sources:

Hive or U-SQL jobs are used to clean and prepare for analysis.

A business process stores large volumes of data in a database or data warehouse.

This data can be stored on Azure Storage and can be easily imported to Azure ML Workspace. Data
can also be imported from Hive or Azure SQL database.

Further in the topic you will learn different types of data used in experiments and ways to use them

Big Data Sources - Considerations

When working with Big Data sources the following points must be considered:

 Multiple files can be uploaded to the Azure ML workspace but maximum size is less
than 2 GBs.
 However, import up to 10 GB of data from other sources is possible.
 If you need to work with even larger volumes of data, statistical
sampling techniques must be used to sample ten gigabytes of data for training.

Training Data

Datasets are broadly classified into two types in Azure ML perspective.

Training Data to train the Experiment

Reference Data providing additional information.

TRAINING DATA : The Data to train the Experiment is mandatory data and acts as the start of
Dataflow.

Move to the next card to learn about reference data.

Reference Data

REFERENCE DATA is not directly used in the experiment or for training a model.It is only used to
provide additional information.

For an example when a web service is published based on the ML model, a service endpoint is
created to consume the web service.

Based on the client using the service, the reference data to be used can be varied accordingly to
provide customisation and flexibility to the web service.

Data Import - Trivia

In this topic, you have learnt ways to import data from various Azure Data stores and the types of
data used. Few other notable points are:

Data can also be imported from On-premises SQL Server or several other online sources using
Import module.

Multiple Data formats such as .txt, .csv, .nh.csv, .tsv, .nh.tsv, Excel file, Azure table, Hive table, SQL
database table, .RData etc.. are supported.

Data types recognised by ML Studio are String, Integer, Double, Boolean, DateTime and TimeSpan.

For more details refer the following:

Import Data

Prepare Data
Scenarios for advanced analytics.

The Lifecycle

A Data Science solution involves:

- Identifying a Business Problem

- Data Extraction

- Data Cleaning

- Data Transformation

- Exploratory Data Analysis

- Data Visualisation

- Machine Learning Modeling

- Publishing the Prediction Service

Adopting ML Studio
Azure Machine Learning Studio helps through the entire lifecycle of a Data
Science solution.
We already had a look at Data Import from various sources, which can be
considered as Data Extraction.
Data Cleaning and Transformation are done based on our business problem and the
approach we take to provide a solution for it. You can see this in the videos over the
following cards.

Data Cleaning and Transformation

Data Cleaning refers to detecting and correcting missing, inaccurate and irrelevant
parts of data while Data transformation refers to converting data from one format to
another.
Azure ML Studio provides these features through Filters, Scale and Reduce,
Manipulation and Sample and Split.
  Filters : Transforms and cleans digital data and can help in Speech Processing
 Manipulation : Cleans missing values, Meta data editing, SQL transforms, etc..
 Scale and Reduce : Normalization, Grouping, Clipping, etc..
 Sample and Split : Partition and Sample data.

Check this, for more info on Data Cleaning and Transformation.

Data Visualisation
Exploratory Data Analysis and Data Visualisation are facilitated by Notebooks in the
Azure ML Studio.Data Visualisation is readily available in Azure ML Studio over the
right-click of uploaded datasets.

However, Notebooks can be used to further visualise data in a required manner with
Python/R scripts adding flexibility and functionality.

Watch the following video to learn using Notebooks for data visualisation.

Machine Learning Modelling

Coming over to devising a Machine Learning Model, Azure ML supports 25 Algorithms.

They are divided into 4 major classes for both Structured and unstructured data.

- Regression

- Classification

- Anomaly Detection

- Clustering

Go through Machine Learning Axioms and other ML courses for model selection and feature
selection.

Supervised Learning
Azure ML Platform is equipped with over 20 types of supervised learning methods in-built and ready
to use.

Users can also write their own python scripts and embed them into the ML workflow for customised
and optimised models using Notebooks and supported ML libraries like sci-kit learn, Tensorflow, etc.

Move to the next cards to check out examples of various Supervised Learning Algorithms along with
concepts of Data cleaning and Transformation.

Regression Model
Watch this video to understand how to train a regression model from a sample
dataset using Azure ML Experimentation service.

Classification Model
Watch this video to understand how to train a classification model from a sample
dataset using Azure ML Experimentation service.

Moving Further
Supervised learning is the widely used ML modelling technique for structured data.
Different algorithms have their own pros and cons. Our requirements must be
decided on to select the optimal algorithm.
Refer the following links for a better understanding on Supervised learning methods
w.r.t Azure ML platform: Feature Engineering, Algorithm Selection and Evaluating
ML Model.
Unsupervised Learning

Unsupervised Learning is used to work on unstructured and un-labelled data.

Clustering is the most commonly used method where similar data is grouped by finding features and
grouping them based on their feature set.

Azure ML Platform supports K-Means Clustering for Unsupervised Learning.

K-Means Clustering
Watch the video to learn using K-Means Clustering Algorithm and visualise data after
clustering.

Recommenders
Recommenders, as their name suggests, are used in sectors of e-commerce, ads
and social platforms etc. They recommend related items of interest based on users
previous interaction.

Watch the following video to learn to model a recommender on Azure ML platform.

What's Next?

In this topic, you learned how to create an ML model from datasets taken and different types of ML
models supported on Azure ML Platform.

Move over to next topic to learn to deploy the ML models as web services.

Refer the following links for further info on: K-Means Clustering and Match Box Recommender.

Using the Trained Models

In the previous topic, training different ML models using Azure ML Platform is discussed.

Once the trained models are tested for accuracy and optimised, they need to be deployed for
consumption through API.

This topic helps to learn to deploy the trained model as a web service using a predictive experiment.

Move through the cards to find out..

Predictive Experiment
Predictive Experiment is created from successful Training Experiment.
 This defines the workflow of processing web requests to generate predictions.
 It is similarly structured to training experiment but the data transformations like
normalisation, are encapsulated into a single block in order to not modify the
training experiment.
 Webservice input and output will be the new blocks added to the experiment.

Webservice

A Webservice is to be created from a Predictive Experiment to consume the generated ML model.

Creating a Webservice generates API end-points which can be accessed through Primary and
Secondary API-keys.

The API end-points take inputs required by the ML model and given JSON output with predictions.

Webservice Workflow
The following workflow is adopted for building a web service with predictive
experiment:

1. Create a training experiment and optimize it.

2. Generate a predictive experiment from the trained model along with operations like
data normalization, encapsulation and transformation.
3. Include definitions for web service inputs and outputs that define how client
applications will consume the model.
4. Modify predictive experiment without affecting training experiment in accordance with
client requirements.
5. Finally, publish the predictive experiment as a web service that can be accessed
through a URL or endpoint.

Web service usage

 Client applications can call the web service, passing in the features and getting the
output according to the schema.
 When new training data is gathered, the training experiment can be re-opened and
improved by retraining.
  Predictive experiment can be updated accordingly while taking consideration of
transforms that encapsulate the trained model and other operations required while
preserving other changes of the predictive experiment.
 With updated predictive model the web service can be re-deployed and client
applications can continue to access through the same endpoint as before.

Moving Further

For more info, refer to the following links: Preparing Predictive Model and Deploying Web Service.

Now as the basics of creating and deploying a Webservice are understood, Move over to the Next
topic to learn more about managing and customising Webservices.

Diving Deep - Web services

This topic covers the

Management

Consumption and

Customizing of Web services according to the client requirements.

You will also learn about metrics and logging regarding the usage of Web services.

Webservices - Factors to consider

After models are created and published as API, we need to make them consumable
by various client applications.
Web services from Azure ML Platform are flexible.
 Web services can be made to retrieve reference data from a database.
 Parameters can be passed to retrieve reference data from the required
database to service different clients.
 Can be managed and monitored with respect to utilization and activity through
logging.
Consumption

Web service can be consumed from the published API either in

Request-Response mode or

Batch Mode in asynchronous way.

API endpoints and API Keys are used according to the requirement.

The APIs are built as REST APIs and can be consumed by required client application by passing
required parameters as an HTTPS request.

Microsoft Excel along with Azure ML Plug-in can also be used to consume the service.

Parameters
Web Service can be customised to take required parameters to access additional
data.
For example, you can specify a database to fetch the data. It will be provided as an
additional parameter apart from the required parameters for a prediction.
This helps in customised client consumption such that each client will use the same
service for prediction but data output/retrieval is different for each of them.
Monitoring

Azure ML Platform enables Web service management through the Usage Statistics and Logging.

Dashboards provide an overview of the total no.of requests made to the API and their success/fail
rate over a selected period of time. They also give the average compute time and latency associated
with the API.

Logging can be enabled for a more detailed JSON response files stored automatically on Azure
storage providing a detailed report of the request and response.

Moving Further

Refer the following links for more info on Consuming Webservice, Adding Parameters, Managing
Webservice and Logging.

Move over to the next topic to learn using these Webservices in Big Data scenarios.
Big Data Scenario

The Webservice API-endpoints can be used as a service by clients for predictions with instant
response.

However, if we want to use ML models in scenarios having large sets of data i.e for Big Data,
processing must be done in batches at scheduled intervals and in optimal times to reduce latency
and promote the asynchronous way of obtaining predictions for our data.

The Azure Data Factory and its pipeline come in to play in these kinds of scenarios.

Azure Data Factory

Azure Data Factory is a cloud service for data movement and transformation and
helps orchestrate big data batch processing tasks through defined pipelines in a
scheduled way.
Pipeline
 Consists of a sequence of activities, which are performed using the linked
services.
 Makes datasets, which define the input and output for each activity.
 Runs activities at scheduled intervals or windows, each operating on the slice
of data that's relevant for that window.
Azure ML in Pipeline

When Big Data batch processing is done by pipeline, predictions can be part of the pipeline with
Azure ML being used as a linked service.

Azure ML batch execution activity is used to call a predictive web service from a pipeline.

The input data set is passed to the web service input and, the predicted output from the web service
is returned continuing to the next activity in the pipeline.

Other Linked services are data sources, like Azure Storage or Azure SQL Database, and compute
services, like Azure HD Insight or Azure Data Link Analytics.
What about Retraining?

In a Big Data Scenario retraining the model might be needed a tad frequently, since the data
generated is of huge amounts and may vary over short intervals of time.

We need fresh data to train the ML model to improve the model accuracy with the changing inflow
of data.

The retraining can be done manually using Azure ML workspace.

However, considering the amount of data required to be handled while Big Data Processes are
ongoing, this is neither efficient nor recommended.

In this situation, Azure Data Factory Pipeline and Azure ML Update Resource Service comes to the
rescue to automate the retraining of ML models.

Automating Retraining
To automate the process of retraining, Azure ML provides us a feature to publish
training experiment as a retraining web service.
The following activities can be executed in sequence, in the Azure Data Factory
Pipeline, to achieve the automation task:
1. Azure ML Batch Execution Activity is used to call the retraining web service to
generate a new model as a file.
2. The model file is passed to an Azure ML Update Resource Activity that
updates the scoring experiment replacing the existing model.
Moving Further

Refer the following links for more info on Predictive Pipelines and Update Resource Activity.

As Big Data processing for predictions is looked into, Move over to the next topic to learn process
real-time data for predictions using the Webservices of Azure ML Platform.

Streaming Process

A Streaming Process is considered as data processing in real-time.

Azure includes a number of services that you can use to implement a streaming process for real-time
data.

An Azure streaming solution consists of inputs, a streaming job, and output.

Input : Are often event hubs or IoT hubs that are used to ingest real-time data at scale.

Streaming Job : Used to process the data. Generally, an Azure Stream Analytics query.

Output : The expected result, could be anything from a database update to a real-time dashboard
with analysis.

Azure Stream Analytics

Stream analytics is an Azure service to process real-time data using Stream
processes.
It works by performing Streaming queries on the real-time data.
The Streaming Query encapsulates a prediction task as a function.
The Azure Webservice is considered as a function in Streaming query which
generates predictions, further sent as output to the function.
So Far...

In this course, you have learnt:

The Building blocks of Azure ML Platform.

Interacting with Azure ML on the web.

Using Azure ML functionality to clean data, create ML models and deploy them as web services.

Consuming the web services in real-time client applications.

Re-training of models using Azure Big data factory.

Usage of Azure ML in IoT and Big data Applications.

The course helps you to get started with creating solutions using Azure Machine Learning Platform.

A web service can be published as Classic or [New]. Does this make any
difference?

Yes; in consuming web service.

No change, except for pricing plan.

Yes; in managing web service.

No change, except for versioning.

Age can be Normalised through _________.

LogNormal

Logistic

MinMax
Zscore

Get the required size of a dataset from a large amount of accumulated data
is called ________.

Rational Sampling

Preperation Sampling

Preprocess Sampling

Statistical Sampling

Average amount of money spent by a user at a Supermarket can be

predicted through ____________ .

Regression

Classification

None of the options

Clustering
Mean variance Normalization is used in case when the parameter
distribution is __________.

Bell shaped Distribution

Skew Distribution

Continuous Distribution

None of the options

All our published web services can be considered as _________.

Azure Apps

Azure Resources

None of the options

Azure App Services

All our published web services can be considered as _________.

Azure Apps
Azure Resources

None of the options

Azure App Services

Log transform is used when __________.

the parameter distribution is exponential

the negative parameter is not valid

the parameter distribution is bell shaped

the parameter relationship is curvy

A client application needs to fetch reference data based on customer

location and data is shared on multiple databases. Servicing the application
through a single prediction web service is possible through
______________.

Parametrising Database Connection

Any of the options

Parametrising Database location

Parametrising Webservice URL

A 5GB data file attained from a U-SQL job can be used for a training
experiment through __________.

Statistical Sampling

Any of the options

Azure Blob Storage

Manual Upl

What is the output of Azure Data Factory pipeline that uses the
AzureMLBatchExecution activity to retrain a model?

prediction file

All the options

model.ilearner file

training data file

In Azure Stream analytics, webservice is added as a ___________.

query

tranformation

function

job

Azure Webservice is based on ____________.

REST API and Xml Format

REST API and JSON Format

SOAP API and JSON Format

All the options

Data Visualization in Azure ML Studio is possible through ________.

Import module and jupyter notebook

Import module

Both inbuilt and jupyter notebook

In-built visualisation options

Jupyter Notebook

Simple way to explore multiple datafiles from a Big Data Job is

____________.

Use Streaming Job

Use Import

Use Azure Data Factory

Downloading the files to Azure Storage and upload into workspace

Which of the following is the best model to predict the number of

earthquakes occurring at a place based on historical data?

Poisson Regression
None of the options

Logistic Regression

Fast forest quantile regression

An environment for working with Azure Machine Learning in an Azure

subscription does not automatically create ___________.

A workspace

A web service

A storage account

A pricing plan

Select the option that represents the correct order of following tasks: (A)
Predictive Experiment (B) Training Experiment (C) Model Evaluation (D)
Data Preprocessing (E) API Publishing

D, B, C, A, E

B, C, D, A, E
B , D, C, A, E

A, B, C, D,

If training time can be traded for accuracy, we can use _____________.

Neural Networks

Boosted Decision Tree

Logistic Regression

Decision Fore

Which of the following can be generally used to clean and prepare Big
Data?

Pandas

U-SQL

Data Warehouse

Data Lake
Select Azure Data Factory pipeline activity that retrieves predictions from
an Azure Machine Learning web service.

AzureBlob

AzureMLBatchExecution

AzureUpdateResource

AzureMLBatchProcessing

To prevent running Import Data module each time, we run an experiment,

when data is imported from Azure Blob storage, we can use
_____________.

Stored Results

Cached Results

Not possible to prevent Import Data module from running.

Generated Results

To retrain the predictive model and update the webservice through Azure
Data Factory, which of the datasets are required?
Scored labels for the output of an AzureMLBatchExecution activity.

An Azure Storage blob for the output of an AzureMLUpdateResource activity.

None of the options

A model.ilearner file for the input of an AzureMLBatchExecution activity

All the options

Which of the following is false about Train Data and Test Data in Azure ML
Studio _________?

Train and Test data are used to Score the Model.

Train data and Test data split should follow a thumb-rule of 80 : 20.

Cross validation data is taken from train data.

Train and Test data random split is reproducible.

I n comparison to Azure Machine Learning Service, Azure Machine

Learning Studio has ____________.
Fewer open-source packages support

All the options

Better CLI and SDK

Better web services

When predicting if the patient has cancer or not, which parameter must be
given importance?

Threshold

Accuracy

Recall

Precision