H2O Module

The H2O Python Module

This module provides access to the H2O JVM, as well as its extensions, objects, machine-learning algorithms, and modeling support capabilities, such as basic munging and feature generation.

The H2O JVM uses a web server so that all communication occurs on a socket (specified by an IP address and a port) via a series of REST calls (see connection.py for the REST layer implementation and details). There is a single active connection to the H2O JVM at any time, and this handle is stashed out of sight in a singleton instance of H2OConnection (this is the global __H2OConn__). In other words, this package does not rely on Jython, and there is no direct manipulation of the JVM.

The H2O python module is not intended as a replacement for other popular machine learning frameworks such as scikit-learn, pylearn2, and their ilk, but is intended to bring H2O to a wider audience of data and machine learning devotees who work exclusively with Python.

H2O from Python is a tool for rapidly turning over models, doing data munging, and building applications in a fast, scalable environment without any of the mental anguish about parallelism and distribution of work.

What is H2O?

H2O is a Java-based software for data modeling and general computing. There are many different perceptions of the H2O software, but the primary purpose of H2O is as a distributed (many machines), parallel (many CPUs), in memory (several hundred GBs Xmx) processing engine.

There are two levels of parallelism:

  • within node
  • across (or between) nodes

The goal, remember, is to easily add more processors to a given problem in order to produce a solution faster. The conceptual paradigm MapReduce (also known as “divide and conquer and combine”), along with a good concurrent application structure, (c.f. jsr166y and NonBlockingHashMap) enable this type of scaling in H2O – we’re really cooking with gas now!

For application developers and data scientists, the gritty details of thread-safety, algorithm parallelism, and node coherence on a network are concealed by simple-to-use REST calls that are all documented here. In addition, H2O is an open-source project under the Apache v2 licence. All of the source code is on github, there is an active google group mailing list, our nightly tests are open for perusal, and our JIRA ticketing system is also open for public use. Last, but not least, we regularly engage the machine learning community all over the nation with a very busy meetup schedule (so if you’re not in The Valley, no sweat, we’re probably coming to your area soon!), and finally, we host our very own H2O World conference. We also sometimes host hack-a-thons at our campus in Mountain View, CA. Needless to say, H2O provides a lot of support for application developers.

In order to make the most out of H2O, there are some key conceptual pieces that are important to know before getting started. Mainly, it’s helpful to know about the different types of objects that live in H2O and what the rules of engagement are in the context of the REST API (which is what any non-JVM interface is all about).

Let’s get started!

The H2O Object System

H2O uses a distributed key-value store (the “DKV”) that contains pointers to the various objects of the H2O ecosystem. The DKV is a kind of biosphere in that it encapsulates all shared objects; however, it may not encapsulate all objects. Some shared objects are mutable by the client; some shared objects are read-only by the client, but are mutable by H2O (e.g. a model being constructed will change over time); and actions by the client may have side-effects on other clients (multi-tenancy is not a supported model of use, but it is possible for multiple clients to attach to a single H2O cloud).

Briefly, these objects are:

  • Key: A key is an entry in the DKV that maps to an object in H2O.
  • Frame: A Frame is a collection of Vec objects. It is a 2D array of elements.
  • Vec: A Vec is a collection of Chunk objects. It is a 1D array of elements.
  • Chunk: A Chunk holds a fraction of the BigData. It is a 1D array of elements.
  • ModelMetrics: A collection of metrics for a given category of model.
  • Model: A model is an immutable object having predict and metrics methods.
  • Job: A Job is a non-blocking task that performs a finite amount of work.

Many of these objects have no meaning to a Python end-user, but to make sense of the objects available in this module it is helpful to understand how these objects map to objects in the JVM. After all, this module is an interface that allows the manipulation of a distributed system.

Objects In This Module

The objects that are of primary concern to the python user are (in order of importance) - Keys - Frames - Vecs - Models - ModelMetrics - Jobs (to a lesser extent) Each of these objects are described in greater detail in this documentation, but a few brief notes are provided here.

H2OFrame

An H2OFrame is a 2D array of uniformly-typed columns. Data in H2O is compressed (often achieving 2-4x better compression than gzip on disk) and is held in the JVM heap (i.e. data is “in memory”), and not in the python process local memory. The H2OFrame is an iterable (supporting list comprehensions) wrapper around a list of H2OVec objects. All an H2OFrame object is, therefore, is a wrapper on a list that supports various types of operations that may or may not be lazy. Here’s an example showing how a list comprehension is combined with lazy expressions to compute the column means for all columns in the H2OFrame:

>>> df = h2o.import_frame(path="smalldata/logreg/prostate.csv")  # import prostate data
>>>
>>> colmeans = [v.mean() for v in df]                            # compute column means
>>>
>>> colmeans                                                     # print the results
[5.843333333333335, 3.0540000000000007, 3.7586666666666693, 1.1986666666666672]

Lazy expressions will be discussed briefly in the coming sections, as they are not necessarily going to be integral to the practicing data scientist. However, their primary purpose is to cut down on the chatter between the client (a.k.a the python interface) and H2O. Lazy expressions are Katamari’d together and only ever evaluated when some piece of output is requested (e.g. print-to-screen).

The set of operations on an H2OFrame is described in a dedicated chapter, but in general, this set of operations closely resembles those that may be performed on an R data.frame. This includes all types of slicing (with complex conditionals), broadcasting operations, and a slew of math operations for transforming and mutating a Frame – all the while the actual Big Data is sitting in the H2O cloud. The semantics for modifying a Frame closely resemble R’s copy-on-modify semantics, except when it comes to mutating a Frame in place. For example, it’s possible to assign all occurrences of the number 0 in a column to missing (or NA in R parlance) as demonstrated in the following snippet:

>>> df = h2o.import_frame(path="smalldata/logreg/prostate.csv")  # import prostate data
>>>
>>> vol = df['VOL']                                              # select the VOL column
>>>
>>> vol[vol == 0] = None                                         # 0 VOL means 'missing'

After this operation, vol has been permanently mutated in place (it is not a copy!).

H2OVec

An H2OVec is a single column of data that is uniformly typed and possibly lazily computed. As with H2OFrame, an H2OVec is a pointer to a distributed Java object residing in the H2O cloud. In reality, an H2OFrame is simply a collection of H2OVec pointers along with some metadata and various member methods.

Expr

In the guts of this module is the Expr class, which defines objects holding the cumulative, unevaluated expressions that may become H2OFrame/H2OVec objects. For example:

>>> fr = h2o.import_frame(path="smalldata/logreg/prostate.csv")  # import prostate data
>>>
>>> a = fr + 3.14159                                             # "a" is now an Expr
>>>
>>> type(a)                                                      # <class 'h2o.expr.Expr'>

These objects are not as important to distinguish at the user level, and all operations can be performed with the mental model of operating on 2D frames (i.e. everything is an H2OFrame).

In the previous snippet, a has not yet triggered any big data evaluation and is, in fact, a pending computation. Once a is evaluated, it stays evaluated. Additionally, all dependent subparts composing a are also evaluated.

This module relies on reference counting of python objects to dispose of out-of-scope objects. The Expr class destroys objects and their big data counterparts in the H2O cloud using a remove call:

>>> fr = h2o.import_frame(path="smalldata/logreg/prostate.csv")  # import prostate data
>>>
>>> h2o.remove(fr)                                               # remove prostate data
>>> fr                                                           # attempting to use fr results in a ValueError

Notice that attempting to use the object after a remove call has been issued will result in a ValueError. Therefore, any working references may not be cleaned up, but they will no longer be functional. Deleting an unevaluated expression will not delete all subparts.

Models

The model-building experience with this module is unique, especially for those coming from a background in scikit-learn. Instead of using objects to build the model, builder functions are provided in the top-level module, and the result of a call is a model object belonging to one of the following categories:

  • Regression
  • Binomial
  • Multinomial
  • Clustering
  • Autoencoder

To better demonstrate this concept, refer to the following example:

>>> fr = h2o.import_frame(path="smalldata/logreg/prostate.csv")  # import prostate data
>>>
>>> fr[1] = fr[1].asfactor()                                     # make 2nd column a factor
>>>
>>> m = h2o.glm(x=fr[3:], y=fr[2])                               # build a glm with a method call
>>>
>>> m.__class__                                                  # <h2o.model.binomial.H2OBinomialModel object at 0x104659cd0>
>>>
>>> m.show()                                                     # print the model details
>>>
>>> m.summary()                                                  # print a model summary

As you can see in the example, the result of the GLM call is a binomial model. This example also showcases an important feature-munging step needed for GLM to perform a classification task rather than a regression task. Namely, the second column is initially read as a numeric column, but it must be changed to a factor by way of the H2OVec operation asfactor. Let’s take a look at this more deeply:

>>> fr = h2o.import_frame(path="smalldata/logreg/prostate.csv")  # import prostate data
>>>
>>> fr[1].isfactor()                                             # produces False
>>>
>>> m = h2o.gbm(x=fr[2:],y=fr[1])                                # build the gbm
>>>
>>> m.__class__                                                  # <h2o.model.regression.H2ORegressionModel object at 0x104d07590>
>>>
>>> fr[1] = fr[1].asfactor()                                     # cast the 2nd column to a factor column
>>>
>>> fr[1].isfactor()                                             # produces True
>>>
>>> m = h2o.gbm(x=fr[2:],y=fr[1])                                # build the gbm
>>>
>>> m.__class__                                                  # <h2o.model.binomial.H2OBinomialModel object at 0x104d18f50>

The above example shows how to properly deal with numeric columns you would like to use in a classification setting. Additionally, H2O can perform on-the-fly scoring of validation data and provide a host of metrics on the validation and training data. Here’s an example of this functionality, where we additionally split the data set into three pieces for training, validation, and finally testing:

>>> fr = h2o.import_frame(path="smalldata/logreg/prostate.csv")  # import prostate
>>>
>>> fr[1] = fr[1].asfactor()                                     # cast to factor
>>>
>>> r = fr[0].runif()                                            # Random UNIform numbers, one per row
>>>
>>> train = fr[ r < 0.6 ]                                        # 60% for training data
>>>
>>> valid = fr[ (0.6 <= r) & (r < 0.9) ]                         # 30% for validation
>>>
>>> test  = fr[ 0.9 <= r ]                                       # 10% for testing
>>>
>>> m = h2o.deeplearning(x=train[2:],y=train[1],validation_x=valid[2:],validation_y=valid[1])  # build a deeplearning with a validation set (yes it's this simple)
>>>
>>> m                                                            # display the model summary by default (can also call m.show())
>>>
>>> m.show()                                                     # equivalent to the above
>>>
>>> m.model_performance()                                        # show the performance on the training data, (can also be m.performance(train=True)
>>>
>>> m.model_performance(valid=True)                              # show the performance on the validation data
>>>
>>> m.model_performance(test_data=test)                          # score and compute new metrics on the test data!

Expanding on this example, there are a number of ways of querying a model for its attributes. Here are some examples of how to do just that:

>>> m.mse()           # MSE on the training data
>>>
>>> m.mse(valid=True) # MSE on the validation data
>>>
>>> m.r2()            # R^2 on the training data
>>>
>>> m.r2(valid=True)  # R^2 on the validation data
>>>
>>> m.confusion_matrix()  # confusion matrix for max F1
>>>
>>> m.confusion_matrix("tpr") # confusion matrix for max true positive rate
>>>
>>> m.confusion_matrix("max_per_class_error")   # etc.

All of our models support various accessor methods such as these. The following section will discuss model metrics in greater detail.

On a final note, each of H2O’s algorithms handles missing (colloquially: “missing” or “NA”) and categorical data automatically differently, depending on the algorithm. You can find out more about each of the individual differences at the following link: http://docs2.h2o.ai/datascience/top.html

Metrics

H2O models exhibit a wide array of metrics for each of the model categories: - Clustering - Binomial - Multinomial - Regression - AutoEncoder In turn, each of these categories is associated with a corresponding H2OModelMetrics class.

All algorithm calls return at least one type of metrics: the training set metrics. When building a model in H2O, you can optionally provide a validation set for on-the-fly evaluation of holdout data. If the validation set is provided, then two types of metrics are returned: the training set metrics and the validation set metrics.

In addition to the metrics that can be retrieved at model-build time, there is a possible third type of metrics available post-build for the final holdout test set that contains data that does not appear in either the training or validation sets: the test set metrics. While the returned object is an H2OModelMetrics rather than an H2O model, it can be queried in the same exact way. Here’s an example:

>>> fr = h2o.import_frame(path="smalldata/iris/iris_wheader.csv")   # import iris
>>>
>>> r = fr[0].runif()                       # generate a random vector for splitting
>>>
>>> train = fr[ r < 0.6 ]                   # split out 60% for training
>>>
>>> valid = fr[ 0.6 <= r & r < 0.9 ]        # split out 30% for validation
>>>
>>> test = fr[ 0.9 <= r ]                   # split out 10% for testing
>>>
>>> my_model = h2o.glm(x=train[1:], y=train[0], validation_x=valid[1:], validation_y=valid[0])  # build a GLM
>>>
>>> my_model.coef()                         # print the GLM coefficients, can also perform my_model.coef_norm() to get the normalized coefficients
>>>
>>> my_model.null_deviance()                # get the null deviance from the training set metrics
>>>
>>> my_model.residual_deviance()            # get the residual deviance from the training set metrics
>>>
>>> my_model.null_deviance(valid=True)      # get the null deviance from the validation set metrics (similar for residual deviance)
>>>
>>> # now generate a new metrics object for the test hold-out data:
>>>
>>> my_metrics = my_model.model_performance(test_data=test) # create the new test set metrics
>>>
>>> my_metrics.null_degrees_of_freedom()    # returns the test null dof
>>>
>>> my_metrics.residual_deviance()          # returns the test res. deviance
>>>
>>> my_metrics.aic()                        # returns the test aic

As you can see, the new model metrics object generated by calling model_performance on the model object supports all of the metric accessor methods as a model. For a complete list of the available metrics for various model categories, please refer to the “Metrics in H2O” section of this document.

Example of H2O on Hadoop

Here is a brief example of H2O on Hadoop:

import h2o
h2o.init(ip="192.168.1.10", port=54321)
--------------------------  ------------------------------------
H2O cluster uptime:         2 minutes 1 seconds 966 milliseconds
H2O cluster version:        0.1.27.1064
H2O cluster name:           H2O_96762
H2O cluster total nodes:    4
H2O cluster total memory:   38.34 GB
H2O cluster total cores:    16
H2O cluster allowed cores:  80
H2O cluster healthy:        True
--------------------------  ------------------------------------
pathDataTrain = ["hdfs://192.168.1.10/user/data/data_train.csv"]
pathDataTest = ["hdfs://192.168.1.10/user/data/data_test.csv"]
trainFrame = h2o.import_frame(path=pathDataTrain)
testFrame = h2o.import_frame(path=pathDataTest)

#Parse Progress: [##################################################] 100%
#Imported [hdfs://192.168.1.10/user/data/data_train.csv'] into cluster with 60000 rows and 500 cols

#Parse Progress: [##################################################] 100%
#Imported ['hdfs://192.168.1.10/user/data/data_test.csv'] into cluster with 10000 rows and 500 cols

trainFrame[499]._name = "label"
testFrame[499]._name = "label"

model = h2o.gbm(x=trainFrame.drop("label"),
            y=trainFrame["label"],
            validation_x=testFrame.drop("label"),
            validation_y=testFrame["label"],
            ntrees=100,
            max_depth=10
            )

#gbm Model Build Progress: [##################################################] 100%

predictFrame = model.predict(testFrame)
model.model_performance(testFrame)

h2o

This module provides all of the top level calls for models and various data transform methods. By simply

class h2o.h2o.H2ODisplay(table=None, header=None, table_header=None, **kwargs)[source]

Pretty printing for H2O Objects; Handles both IPython and vanilla console display

h2o.h2o.as_list(data, use_pandas=True)[source]

Convert an H2O data object into a python-specific object.

WARNING: This will pull all data local!

If Pandas is available (and use_pandas is True), then pandas will be used to parse the data frame. Otherwise, a list-of-lists populated by character data will be returned (so the types of data will all be str).

Parameters:
  • data – An H2O data object.
  • use_pandas – Try to use pandas for reading in the data.
Returns:

List of list (Rows x Columns).

h2o.h2o.autoencoder(x, **kwargs)[source]

Build an Autoencoder

Parameters:
  • x – Columns with which to build an autoencoder
  • kwargs – Additional arguments to pass to the autoencoder.
Returns:

A new autoencoder model

h2o.h2o.cbind(left, right)[source]
Parameters:
  • left – H2OFrame or H2OVec
  • right – H2OFrame or H2OVec
Returns:

new H2OFrame with left|right cbinded

h2o.h2o.check_dims_values(python_obj, h2o_frame, rows, cols)[source]

Check that the dimensions and values of the python object and H2OFrame are equivalent. Assumes that the python object conforms to the rules specified in the h2o frame documentation. :param python_obj: a (nested) list, tuple, dictionary, numpy.ndarray, ,or pandas.DataFrame :param h2o_frame: an H2OFrame :param rows: number of rows :param cols: number of columns :return: None

h2o.h2o.cluster_info()[source]

Display the current H2O cluster information.

Returns:None
h2o.h2o.deeplearning(x, y=None, validation_x=None, validation_y=None, **kwargs)[source]

Build a supervised Deep Learning model (kwargs are the same arguments that you can find in FLOW)

Returns:Return a new classifier or regression model.
h2o.h2o.download_pojo(model, path='')[source]

Download the POJO for this model to the directory specified by path (no trailing slash!). If path is “”, then dump to screen. :param model: Retrieve this model’s scoring POJO. :param path: An absolute path to the directory where POJO should be saved. :return: None

h2o.h2o.export_file(frame, path, force=False)[source]

Export a given H2OFrame to a path on the machine this python session is currently connected to. To view the current session, call h2o.cluster_info().

Parameters:
  • frame – The Frame to save to disk.
  • path – The path to the save point on disk.
  • force – Overwrite any preexisting file with the same path
Returns:

None

h2o.h2o.frame(frame_id)[source]

Retrieve metadata for a id that points to a Frame.

Parameters:frame_id – A pointer to a Frame in H2O.
Returns:Meta information on the frame
h2o.h2o.frame_summary(key)[source]

Retrieve metadata and summary information for a key that points to a Frame/Vec

Parameters:key – A pointer to a Frame/Vec in H2O
Returns:Meta and summary info on the frame
h2o.h2o.frames()[source]

Retrieve all the Frames.

Returns:Meta information on the frames
h2o.h2o.gbm(x, y, validation_x=None, validation_y=None, **kwargs)[source]

Build a Gradient Boosted Method model (kwargs are the same arguments that you can find in FLOW)

Returns:A new classifier or regression model.
h2o.h2o.get_model(model_id)[source]

Return the specified model

Parameters:model_id – The model identification in h2o
h2o.h2o.glm(x, y, validation_x=None, validation_y=None, **kwargs)[source]

Build a Generalized Linear Model (kwargs are the same arguments that you can find in FLOW)

Returns:A new regression or binomial classifier.
h2o.h2o.import_file(path)[source]

Import a single file or collection of files.

Parameters:path – A path to a data file (remote or local).
Returns:A new H2OFrame
h2o.h2o.import_frame(path=None, vecs=None)[source]

Import a frame from a file (remote or local machine). If you run H2O on Hadoop, you can access to HDFS

Parameters:path – A path specifying the location of the data to import.
Returns:A new H2OFrame
h2o.h2o.impute(data, column, method=['mean', 'median', 'mode'], combine_method=['interpolate', 'average', 'low', 'high'], by=None, inplace=True)[source]

Impute a column in this H2OFrame.

Parameters:
  • column – The column to impute
  • method – How to compute the imputation value.
  • combine_method – For even samples and method=”median”, how to combine quantiles.
  • by – Columns to group-by for computing imputation value per groups of columns.
  • inplace – Impute inplace?
Returns:

the imputed frame.

h2o.h2o.init(ip='localhost', port=54321, size=1, start_h2o=False, enable_assertions=False, license=None, max_mem_size_GB=None, min_mem_size_GB=None, ice_root=None, strict_version_check=True)[source]

Initiate an H2O connection to the specified ip and port.

Parameters:
  • ip – An IP address, default is “localhost”
  • port – A port, default is 54321
  • size – THe expected number of h2o instances (ignored if start_h2o is True)
  • start_h2o – A boolean dictating whether this module should start the H2O jvm. An attempt is made anyways if _connect fails.
  • enable_assertions – If start_h2o, pass -ea as a VM option.s
  • license – If not None, is a path to a license file.
  • max_mem_size_GB – Maximum heap size (jvm option Xmx) in gigabytes.
  • min_mem_size_GB – Minimum heap size (jvm option Xms) in gigabytes.
  • ice_root – A temporary directory (default location is determined by tempfile.mkdtemp()) to hold H2O log files.
Returns:

None

h2o.h2o.keys_leaked(num_keys)[source]

Ask H2O if any keys leaked. @param num_keys: The number of keys that should be there. :return: A boolean True/False if keys leaked. If keys leaked, check H2O logs for further detail.

h2o.h2o.kmeans(x, validation_x=None, **kwargs)[source]

Build a KMeans model (kwargs are the same arguments that you can find in FLOW)

Returns:A new clustering model
h2o.h2o.locate(path)[source]

Search for a relative path and turn it into an absolute path. This is handy when hunting for data files to be passed into h2o and used by import file. Note: This function is for unit testing purposes only.

Parameters:path – Path to search for
Returns:Absolute path if it is found. None otherwise.
h2o.h2o.log_and_echo(message)[source]

Log a message on the server-side logs This is helpful when running several pieces of work one after the other on a single H2O cluster and you want to make a notation in the H2O server side log where one piece of work ends and the next piece of work begins.

Sends a message to H2O for logging. Generally used for debugging purposes.

Parameters:message – A character string with the message to write to the log.
Returns:None
h2o.h2o.np_comparison_check(h2o_data, np_data, num_elements)[source]

Check values achieved by h2o against values achieved by numpy :param h2o_data: an H2OFrame or H2OVec :param np_data: a numpy array :param num_elements: number of elements to compare :return: None

h2o.h2o.ou()[source]

Where is my baguette!? :return: the name of the baguette. oh uhr uhr huhr

h2o.h2o.parse(setup, h2o_name, first_line_is_header=(-1, 0, 1))[source]

Trigger a parse; blocking; removeFrame just keep the Vecs.

Parameters:
  • setup – The result of calling parse_setup.
  • h2o_name – The name of the H2O Frame on the back end.
  • first_line_is_header – -1 means data, 0 means guess, 1 means header.
Returns:

A new parsed object

h2o.h2o.parse_raw(setup, id=None, first_line_is_header=(-1, 0, 1))[source]

Used in conjunction with import_file and parse_setup in order to make alterations before parsing. :param setup: Result of h2o.parse_setup :param id: An optional id for the frame. :param first_line_is_header: -1,0,1 if the first line is to be used as the header :return: An H2OFrame object

h2o.h2o.parse_setup(raw_frames)[source]
Parameters:raw_frames – A collection of imported file frames
Returns:A ParseSetup “object”
h2o.h2o.random_forest(x, y, validation_x=None, validation_y=None, **kwargs)[source]

Build a Random Forest Model (kwargs are the same arguments that you can find in FLOW)

Returns:A new classifier or regression model.
h2o.h2o.rapids(expr)[source]

Fire off a Rapids expression.

Parameters:expr – The rapids expression (ascii string).
Returns:The JSON response of the Rapids execution
h2o.h2o.remove(object)[source]

Remove object from H2O. This is a “hard” delete of the object. It removes all subparts.

Parameters:object – The object pointing to the object to be removed.
Returns:None
h2o.h2o.removeFrameShallow(key)[source]

Do a shallow DKV remove of the frame (does not remove any internal Vecs). This is a “soft” delete. Just removes the top level pointer, but all big data remains! :param key: A Frame Key to be removed :return: None

h2o.h2o.remove_all()[source]

Remove all objects from H2O.

:return None

h2o.h2o.split_frame(data, ratios=[0.75], destination_frames=None)[source]

Split a frame into distinct subsets of size determined by the given ratios. The number of subsets is always 1 more than the number of ratios given. :param data: The dataset to split. :param ratios: The fraction of rows for each split. :param destination_frames: names of the split frames :return: a list of frames

h2o.h2o.store_size()[source]

Get the H2O store size (current count of keys). :return: number of keys in H2O cloud

h2o.h2o.upload_file(path, destination_frame='')[source]

Upload a dataset at the path given from the local machine to the H2O cluster.

Parameters:
  • path – A path specifying the location of the data to upload.
  • destination_frame – The name of the H2O Frame in the H2O Cluster.
Returns:

A new H2OFrame