POPLOG-NEURAL 2.02/2.021/2.03 RELEASE NOTES ------------------------------------------- 1. Introduction --------------- Poplog-Neural 2.02 is a maintenance version to run at Poplog 14.5. This document provides a brief description of changes made since Poplog-Neural 2.0, the last issued version. Poplog-Neural 2.021 has the same functionality as 2.02 but with minor modifications to make it run on SG IRIX 5.2/3. Poplog-Neural 2.03 has the same functionality as 2.02/2.021 but with minor modifications to make it run on Poplog 15.0 and also under Linux/PC. Note that 2.03 is not supported on the following machines: HP 9000/3xx+4xx machines (M68K-based machines); Sun 3 workstations; Silicon Graphics running IRIX 4.x or earlier. 2a. System Requirements (version 2.02/2.021) -------------------------------------------- Poplog-Neural 2.02 requires a Poplog 14.5 system to run. Poplog-Neural 2.02 will not run with previous versions of Poplog. 2.02 is the first issued version of Poplog-Neural which will run under Solaris 2.x on SPARC and under HP-UX 9.x on HP PA-RISC. Approximately 5-10Mb of free disk space will be required for a complete installation depending on the version. Poplog-Neural should not be installed over the top of an existing version. For some types of development work, X development libraries will be required. These are documented in the Poplog 14.5 Installation Guide. 2b. System Requirements (version 2.03) -------------------------------------- Poplog-Neural 2.03 requires a Poplog 15.0 system to run. Poplog-Neural 2.03 will not run with previous versions of Poplog. 2.03 is the first issued version of Poplog-Neural which will run under Linux 1.0 on Intel x86. Approximately 5-10Mb of free disk space will be required for a complete installation depending on the version. Poplog-Neural should not be installed over the top of an existing version. For some types of development work, X development libraries will be required. These are documented in the Poplog 15.0 Installation & Administrators Guide. 3. Changes & Compatibility -------------------------- Various minor changes have been made, including some bug fixes (see next section). Poplog-Neural 2.02 is source compatible with Poplog-Neural 2.0 and no changes should be required for user code to run at the new version. Poplog-Neural 2.021 requires that the value of the environment variable HOST_TYPE is set to irisr5, e.g. by typing: setenv HOST_TYPE irisr5 Poplog-Neural 2.03 has a slightly modified installation procedure. In particular, it no longer requires the user to set HOST_TYPE manually in a .login file. Instead, the user now sources a file ($popneural/bin/setneural) which sets HOST_TYPE if it has not defined previously. 4. Bug Fixes ------------ PNF0039: nn_load_net Ref Entry Gives Incorrect Return Result -------- nn_load_nets documentation is wrong. It doesn't return a boolean when the read succeeds, it returns the network record. PNF0042: Incorrect Documentation For Example Set Flag Access/Update -------- The REF EXAMPLESETS file says that accessors and updaters for example set flags can accept the name of the example set. This is incorrect - they take the example set record itself. PNF0043: Set Warning Message is incorrect -------- The warning message printed when an item is passed to a set conversion function which isn't actually in the defined set prints the wrong object (it prints the datatype record for the set rather than the item which is not in the set). PNF0044: nn_generate_egs Can Call Generator Procedure Too Often -------- When the source of an example set is a procedure, nn_generate_egs applies the procedure an extra time. This can be very problematic when the procedure returns different data each time or returns very large data structures. PNF0046: Loading Set Datatypes Reverses Member Order -------- nn_load_dt on a set reverses the order of the set items. This means that the units on the network (both input and output) will no longer correspond to the initial setting. 5. Bugs Raised Since Neural 2.0 ------------------------------- PNF0040: Interaction With Lib Xlib/NEWEXTERNAL -------- The C version of Poplog-Neural (version 2.01 onwards) does not load if lib Xlib or any other library which uses NEWEXTERNAL has been loaded. The reason is a bug in NEWC_DEC which causes arrays to be passed incorrectly to the C code and means they become corrupted. Currently Neural has to use LIB EXTERNAL and LIB C_DEC. PNF0041: Neural User Guide Example Uses Random Learning -------- Page 39 of the NUG has the following example: nn_learn_egs("colour_set", "col_net", 5000, false); This often does not work correctly and the last argument should be "true" for more consistent results i.e.: nn_learn_egs("colour_set", "col_net", 5000, true); PNF0045: Training Iterations Documentation Is Incorrect -------- The documentation for the number of training presentation says that the number specifies the number of presentations of the example set. In fact this gives the number of single presentations. For example, this means that for an example set with n examples and m iterations are specified, if n > m then the last (n - m) examples will never be presented.