Introduction to PyTorch: Build a Neural Network to Recognize Handwritten Digits

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Introduction

Machine learning is a field of computer science that finds patterns in data. As of 2021, machine learning practitioners use these patterns to detect lanes for self-driving cars; train a robot hand to solve a Rubik’s cube; or generate images of dubious artistic taste. As machine learning models grow more accurate and performant, we see increasing adoption in mainstream applications and products.

Deep learning is a subset of machine learning that focuses on particularly complex models, termed neural networks. In later, advanced DigitalOcean articles (like this tutorial on building an Atari bot), we will formally define what “complex” means. Neural networks are the highly accurate and hype-inducing modern-day models your hear about, with applications across a wide range of tasks. In this tutorial, you will focus on one specific task called object recognition, or image classification. Given an image of a handwritten digit, your model will predict which digit is shown.

You will build, train, and evaluate deep neural networks in PyTorch, a framework developed by Facebook AI Research for deep learning. When compared to other deep learning frameworks, like Tensorflow, PyTorch is a beginner-friendly framework with debugging features that aid in the building process. It’s also highly customizable for advanced users, with researchers and practitioners using it across companies like Facebook and Tesla. By the end of this tutorial, you will be able to:

• Build, train, and evaluate a deep neural network in PyTorch
• Understand the risks of applying deep learning

While you won’t need prior experience in practical deep learning or PyTorch to follow along with this tutorial, we’ll assume some familiarity with machine learning terms and concepts such as training and testing, features and labels, optimization, and evaluation. You can learn more about these concepts in An Introduction to Machine Learning.