Microsoft's Azure Machine Learning is and end-to-end data science and analytics solution that helps professional data scientists to prepare data, develop experiments, and deploy models in the cloud. It replaces the Azure Machine Learning Workbench.
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Dataiku
Score 8.5 out of 10
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The Dataiku platform unifies data work from analytics to Generative AI. It supports enterprise analytics with visual, cloud-based tooling for data preparation, visualization, and workflow automation.
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TensorFlow
Score 7.7 out of 10
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TensorFlow is an open-source machine learning software library for numerical computation using data flow graphs. It was originally developed by Google.
Most of the machine learning platforms these days support integration with R and Python libraries. So, the use of reusable libraries is not an issue. TensorFlow performs well in cloud hosting and support for GPU/TPU. However, where it lacks compared to Azure is a graphical …
Dataiku is an awesome tool for data scientists. It really makes our lives easier. It is also really good for non technical users to see and follow along with the process. I do think that people can fall into the trap of using it without any knowledge at all because so much is automated, but I dont think that is the fault of Dataiku.
TensorFlow is great for most deep learning purposes. This is especially true in two domains: 1. Computer vision: image classification, object detection and image generation via generative adversarial networks 2. Natural language processing: text classification and generation. The good community support often means that a lot of off-the-shelf models can be used to prove a concept or test an idea quickly. That, and Google's promotion of Colab means that ideas can be shared quite freely. Training, visualizing and debugging models is very easy in TensorFlow, compared to other platforms (especially the good old Caffe days). In terms of productionizing, it's a bit of a mixed bag. In our case, most of our feature building is performed via Apache Spark. This means having to convert Parquet (columnar optimized) files to a TensorFlow friendly format i.e., protobufs. The lack of good JVM bindings mean that our projects end up being a mix of Python and Scala. This makes it hard to reuse some of the tooling and support we wrote in Scala. This is where MXNet shines better (though its Scala API could do with more work).
User friendliness: This is by far the most user friendly tool I've seen in analytics. You don't need to know how to code at all! Just create a few blocks, connect a few lines and you are capable of running a boosted decision tree with a very high R squared!
Speed: Azure ML is a cloud based tool, so processing is not made with your computer, making the reliability and speed top notch!
Cost: If you don't know how to code, this is by far the cheapest machine learning tool out there. I believe it costs less than $15/month. If you know how to code, then R is free.
Connectivity: It is super easy to embed R or Python codes on Azure ML. So if you want to do more advanced stuff, or use a model that is not yet available on Azure ML, you can simply paste the code on R or Python there!
Microsoft environment: Many many companies rely on the Microsoft suite. And Azure ML connects perfectly with Excel, CSV and Access files.
The integrated windows of frontend and backend in web applications make it cumbersome for the developer.
When dealing with multiple data flows, it becomes really confusing, though they have introduced a feature (Zones) to cater to this issue.
Bundling, exporting, and importing projects sometimes create issues related to code environment. If the code environment is not available, at least the schema of the flow we should be able to import should be.
Theano is perhaps a bit faster and eats up less memory than TensorFlow on a given GPU, perhaps due to element-wise ops. Tensorflow wins for multi-GPU and “compilation” time.
The user experience is very good. Everything feels intuitive and "flows" (sorry excuse the pun) so nicely, and the customization level is also appropriate to the tool. Even as a newer data scientist, it felt easy to use and the explanations/tutorials were very good. The documentation is also at a good level
The open source user community is friendly, helpful, and responsive, at times even outdoing commercial software vendors. Documentation is also top notch, and usually resolves issues without the need for human interactions. Great product design, with a focus on user experience, also makes platform use intuitive, thus reducing the need for explicit support.
Community support for TensorFlow is great. There's a huge community that truly loves the platform and there are many examples of development in TensorFlow. Often, when a new good technique is published, there will be a TensorFlow implementation not long after. This makes it quick to ally the latest techniques from academia straight to production-grade systems. Tooling around TensorFlow is also good. TensorBoard has been such a useful tool, I can't imagine how hard it would be to debug a deep neural network gone wrong without TensorBoard.
It is easier to learn, it has a very cost effective license for use, it has native build and created for Azure cloud services, and that makes it perfect when compared against the alternatives. As a Microsoft tool, it has been built to contain many visual features and improved usability even for non-specialist users.
Anaconda is mainly used by professional data scientists who have profound knowledge of Python coding, mainly used for building some new algorithm block or some optimization, then the module will be integrated into the Dataiku pipeline/workflow. While Dataiku can be used by even other kinds of users.
Keras is built on top of TensorFlow, but it is much simpler to use and more Python style friendly, so if you don't want to focus on too many details or control and not focus on some advanced features, Keras is one of the best options, but as far as if you want to dig into more, for sure TensorFlow is the right choice
Productivity: Instead of coding and recoding, Azure ML helped my organization to get to meaningful results faster;
Cost: Azure ML can save hundreds (or even thousands) of dollars for an organization, since the license costs around $15/month per seat.
Focus on insights and not on statistics: Since running a model is so easy, analysts can focus more on recommendations and insights, rather than statistical details
