Efficient fine-tuning using Low-Rank Adaptation (LORA) is a game-changer for LLaMA, allowing it to adapt quickly to new tasks with minimal computational overhead.
By pruning and reparameterizing the original LLaMA model, LORA reduces the number of parameters that need to be updated, making it faster and more efficient.
This approach is particularly useful for fine-tuning LLaMA on smaller datasets or when computational resources are limited.
With LORA, you can fine-tune LLaMA on a smaller scale, achieving similar performance to traditional fine-tuning methods while using significantly less computational power.
Fine-Tuning Method
Fine-tuning a pre-trained LLM like LLaMA is a highly efficient process with LoRA, where instead of fine-tuning all the weights, it optimizes rank decomposition matrices of the dense layers to change during adaptation.
These matrices constitute the LoRA adapter, which is then merged with the pre-trained model and used for inferencing. The number of parameters is determined by the rank and shape of the original weights, resulting in a significant reduction in trainable parameters.
For example, the LLaMA 2 7B model parameters could be loaded in int8, with 1 GB trainable parameters loaded in fp16, reducing the size of the loaded model to be fine-tuned to 15-17 GB.
Fine Tuning: Key Concepts
Fine-tuning large language models involves adapting the pre-trained model to perform specific tasks or understand particular domains better. This is achieved by training the model on a new dataset that is more focused on the desired task or domain.
The fine-tuning process adjusts the weights of the model's neural network, enabling it to make better predictions or generate more accurate responses based on the new data. This process is particularly useful in scenarios where multiple clients need fine-tuned models for different applications.
Fine-tuning large language models requires huge computing resources, but LLM tuning is a specialized process that takes a pre-trained language model and customizes it for specific tasks or domains. This method leverages the general language understanding, acquired by the model during its initial training phase, and adapts it to more specialized requirements.
To fine-tune a model, you need to update a small subset of the model's parameters, using the LoRA (Low-Rank Adaptation) method. This method focuses on modifying only the weights of certain layers within the model, specifically targeting those that are most impactful for the task.
The LoraConfig class specifies settings for Parameter-Efficient Fine-Tuning (PEFT). Parameters like lora_alpha, lora_dropout, r, and bias define the architecture and behavior of the LoRA layers used for efficient fine-tuning.
Here are some key concepts commonly used in LLM fine tuning:
- Fine-tuning the model's neural network
- Updating a small subset of the model's parameters
- Using the LoRA (Low-Rank Adaptation) method
- Parameter-Efficient Fine-Tuning (PEFT)
- LoraConfig class
Enable Multi-Layer Support
Enabling LoRA for more layers can significantly improve a model's performance, especially in specialized tasks. This is because LoRA allows for fine-grained adjustments throughout the model's architecture.
By enabling LoRA for additional layers, such as the projection layer, you can increase the number of trainable parameters by a factor of 5, from 4,194,304 to 20,277,248, for a 7B Llama 2 model. This comes with a larger memory requirement, but can lead to noticeable improvements in modeling performance.
Enabling LoRA for all layers, including the linear output layer, can result in more significant improvements in specialized tasks. However, this also increases the memory requirement, from 14.18 GB to 16.62 GB, for a 7B Llama 2 model.
It's worth noting that exploring different combinations of LoRA-enabled layers can be beneficial. For example, activating LoRA for the projection layer might be beneficial, but this hasn't been explored in this experiment.
Experimental Setup
To fine-tune the Llama 2 7B-chat model, we need to understand the experimental setup.
The model characterization provides valuable insight into GPU memory utilization, training loss, and computational efficiency.
The experiment was conducted on a PowerEdge R760xa server with 1 A100-40 GB GPU using the Open-source SAMsum dataset.
We used the DeepSpeed Flops Profiler to measure the tera floating-point operations (TFLOPs) on the GPU.
Table 1 shows the actual memory footprint of the Llama 27B model using the LoRA technique.
The total memory usage for a batch size of 1 is 10 GB, which is equivalent to 9.31 GiB.
Steps
To fine-tune LLaMA 2, you'll need to download the LLaMA 2 model from Meta's git repo. You can then convert it to a Hugging face model type to use the PEFT libraries used in the LoRA technique.
First, you'll need to build a conda environment and clone the example fine-tuning recipes from Meta's git repository. This will give you a starting point for fine-tuning your LLaMA 2 model.
To load your dataset, use the dataloader library of Hugging face, and perform any necessary preprocessing. You'll also need to input your config file entries, including the PEFT method, model name, output directory, save model location, and more.
Here's a breakdown of the config file entries you'll need:
Once you've set up your config file, you can run the fine-tuning process using the following command:
python3 llama_finetuning.py --use_peft --peft_method lora --quantization --model_name location_of_hugging_face_model
Experiment Results
The fine-tuning experiments were run at batch sizes 4 and 7, with surprising results. For these two scenarios, we calculated training losses, GPU utilization, and GPU throughput.
At batch size 8, we encountered an out-of-memory (OOM) error for the given dataset on 1*A100 with 40 GB. This indicates the importance of batch size in GPU memory utilization.
The GPU memory utilization was captured with LoRA technique, showing that at batch size 1, used memory was 9.31 GB, at batch size 4, used memory was 26.21 GB, and at batch size 7, memory used was 39.31 GB.
The GPU memory usage remains constant throughout fine-tuning, as shown in Figure 9, and is dependent on the batch size. We calculated the reserved memory per batch to be 4.302 GB on 1*A100.
The GPU TFLOP was determined using DeepSpeed Profiler, and we found that FLOPs vary linearly with the number of batches sent in each step, indicating that FLOPs per token is the constant.
The GPU multiple-accumulate operations (MACs) also follow a linear dependency on the batch size and hence constant per token. This is shown in Figure 11.
The time taken for fine-tuning, also known as epoch time, is given in table 4. It shows that the training time does not vary much, which strengthens our argument that the FLOPs per token is constant.
Conclusion and Recommendation
We've successfully fine-tuned a large-language model using LoRA, and the results are impressive.
Using a PEFT technique like LoRA can help reduce the memory requirement for fine-tuning a large-language model on a proprietary dataset.
A Dell PowerEdge R760xa featuring the NVIDIA A100-40GB GPU was used to fine-tune a Llama 2 7B model, achieving significant memory savings.
Reducing the batch size can also help minimize automatic memory allocation, which is especially useful for larger datasets.
In our experiment, a lower batch size had no impact on the training time or training performance.
The memory capacity required to fine-tune the Llama 2 7B model was reduced from 84GB to a level that easily fits on the 1*A100 40 GB card by using the LoRA technique.
Here's a quick summary of our key findings:
- Use LoRA to reduce memory requirements for fine-tuning large-language models.
- Consider using a lower batch size to minimize automatic memory allocation.
- LoRA can significantly reduce memory requirements, making it easier to fine-tune large models on smaller hardware.
Efficiency and Resource Optimization
LoRA's efficiency in training and adaptation is a game-changer for large language models like LLaMA. It enhances the training and adaptation efficiency by introducing low-rank matrices that only modify a subset of the original model's weights.
This selective updating streamlines the adaptation process, making it significantly quicker and more efficient. It allows the model to adapt to new tasks or datasets without the need to extensively retrain the entire model.
LoRA reduces the computational resources required for fine-tuning large language models. By using low-rank matrices to update specific parameters, the approach drastically cuts down the number of parameters that need to be trained.
This reduction is crucial for practical applications, as fully retraining LLM models like LLaMA is beyond the resource capabilities of most organizations. LoRA's efficiency is particularly beneficial for applications that require regular updates or adaptations, such as adapting a model to specialized domains or continuously evolving datasets.
Training 7B parameter models on a single GPU is now possible with LoRA. By adjusting the rank of the low-rank matrices and using mixed precision, you can efficiently fine-tune large models on limited hardware resources.
Reduced Resource Requirement
LoRA drastically cuts down the number of parameters that need to be trained, making it a game-changer for large language models.
By using low-rank matrices to update specific parameters, LoRA reduces the computational resources required for fine-tuning large language models. This is crucial for practical applications, as fully retraining LLM models like GPT-3 is beyond the resource capabilities of most organizations.
LoRA's method requires less memory and processing power, making it possible to train large models even on hardware with limited resources. In fact, it allows for quicker iterations and experiments, as each training cycle consumes fewer resources.
Fine-tuning a 7B parameter model on a single GPU is achievable with LoRA, requiring only 17.86 GB of memory and 3 hours of training time. This is made possible by adjusting the rank of the low-rank matrices used in LoRA.
Model Weight Preservation
Preserving model weights is crucial for maintaining a model's broad understanding and capabilities.
By using LoRA, you can selectively update weights through low-rank matrices, ensuring the core structure and knowledge embedded in the pre-trained model are largely maintained.
This approach prevents the loss of general knowledge the model originally possessed, which can happen when all weights are subject to change in traditional fine-tuning.
LoRA's preservation of pre-trained model weights is a significant advantage, allowing the model to adapt to specific tasks or datasets while retaining its strengths.
The fine-tuned model retains the model's understanding of language and context, while gaining new capabilities or improved performance in targeted areas.
Model Weight Preservation
LoRA preserves the integrity of pre-trained model weights, which is a significant advantage. This means that the core structure and knowledge embedded in the pre-trained model are largely maintained.
Traditional fine-tuning can lead to a loss of the general knowledge the model originally possessed. All weights of the model are subject to change, which can be detrimental to the model's broad understanding and capabilities.
LoRA's approach of selectively updating weights through low-rank matrices ensures that the fine-tuned model retains the strengths of the original model. This includes its understanding of language and context.
The preservation of pre-trained model weights is crucial for maintaining the model's broad understanding and capabilities. It allows the fine-tuned model to adapt to specific tasks or datasets while retaining its original strengths.
Fine-tuning with LoRA ensures that the model gains new capabilities or improved performance in targeted areas. It's an efficient way to adapt a pre-trained model to a new task without losing its original knowledge.
Understanding
LoRA (Low-Rank Adaptation) is an approach that makes it possible to fine-tune large pre-trained models like LLMs without the need for extensive retraining.
This method is crucial because training large models like GPT-3 is computationally expensive and resource-intensive. By introducing a low-rank decomposition into the weight matrices of the neural network, LoRA allows for efficient parameter updates during the fine-tuning process.
LoRA works by "injecting" trainable parameters into a pre-trained model in a way that doesn't require modifying all the original parameters of the model. This is achieved by freezing the original weights and introducing low-rank matrices that interact with the original weights to adapt the model to new tasks.
The original parameters of the model are kept unchanged, and instead of retraining the heavy parameters, LoRA adds small, trainable matrices that adapt the model to new tasks. This decomposition significantly reduces the number of parameters that need to be learned during the fine-tuning process.
For instance, if the weight matrix W is an m x n matrix, its decomposition into A and B (where A is m x r and B is r x n) results in r(m + n) parameters instead of mn, where r is the rank and r << min(m, n).
The benefits of using LoRA include parameter efficiency, flexibility and scalability, faster training speed, and no additional inference latency.
Tips and Best Practices
Fine-tuning LLMs with LoRA and QLoRA requires careful attention to detail to achieve the best results. Here are some tips to keep in mind.
To get started, it's essential to have a solid understanding of the LoRA and QLoRA methods. Here are some practical tips for fine-tuning LLMs with these methods.
One key tip is to have a clear goal in mind for your fine-tuning process. This will help you determine the best approach and ensure you're making the most of your time and resources.
Start with a small dataset and gradually increase the size as you fine-tune the model. This will help you avoid overfitting and ensure the model is generalizing well.
Fine-Tuning Challenges and Solutions
Fine-tuning LLMs can be a complex process, and LoRA is no exception. Despite its efficiency, it still requires careful consideration to avoid overfitting.
Overfitting can occur when the model is too complex and learns the noise in the training data. LoRA's rank determines the number of trainable parameters, and a larger rank can lead to more overfitting.
To mitigate this, decreasing the rank or increasing the dataset size can help. Additionally, adjusting the weight decay rate in AdamW or SGD optimizers, and increasing the dropout value for LoRA layers can also help.
Here are some practical tips to keep in mind when fine-tuning with LoRA:
Lessons from Hundreds of Experiments
Fine-tuning large language models (LLMs) can be a daunting task, but the good news is that there are many practical tips and tricks to make the process more efficient. One of the most effective techniques is Low-rank adaptation (LoRA), which has been widely used and proven to be effective.
Despite the inherent randomness of LLM training, the outcomes remain remarkably consistent across multiple runs. This means that you can expect similar results even if you run the same experiment multiple times.
The choice of optimizer shouldn't be a major concern when fine-tuning LLMs. While SGD on its own is suboptimal, there's minimal variation in outcomes whether you employ AdamW, SGD with a scheduler, or AdamW with a scheduler.
Iterating multiple times, as done in multi-epoch training, might not be beneficial for static datasets. In fact, it often deteriorates the results, probably due to overfitting.
To maximize model performance when using LoRA, ensure it's applied across all layers, not just to the Key and Value matrices. This small detail can make a big difference in the final results.
Adjusting the LoRA rank is essential, and so is selecting an apt alpha value. A good heuristic is setting alpha at twice the rank's value.
Here's a quick summary of the key takeaways from the article:
Fine Tuning: Key Challenges
Fine-tuning large language models can be a complex task, and there are several key challenges that need to be addressed. One of the main challenges is the huge computing resources required to train the models, which makes it difficult for smaller organizations or individuals to create their own LLMs.
The size of the model is a significant challenge, with some models having billions of parameters. For example, the Llama 2 7B model has 7 billion parameters, which can be a significant burden on computing resources. To address this, techniques like LoRA (Low-Rank Adaptation) can be used to reduce the number of parameters that need to be trained.
Another challenge is overfitting, which occurs when the model becomes too specialized to the training data and fails to generalize to new data. To avoid overfitting, it's essential to use techniques like weight decay and dropout, and to increase the dataset size.
LoRA can also be used to address overfitting by reducing the number of trainable parameters. However, it's essential to choose the right rank and alpha value for LoRA to maximize model performance.
Here are some key challenges and potential solutions:
Overall, fine-tuning large language models requires careful consideration of the key challenges and potential solutions. By using techniques like LoRA and addressing overfitting, it's possible to create highly effective LLMs that can perform a wide range of tasks.
Sources
- https://infohub.delltechnologies.com/p/llama-2-efficient-fine-tuning-using-low-rank-adaptation-lora-on-single-gpu/
- https://magazine.sebastianraschka.com/p/practical-tips-for-finetuning-llms
- https://www.run.ai/guides/generative-ai/lora-fine-tuning
- https://blog.monsterapi.ai/blogs/lora-vs-qlora/
- https://www.run.ai/guides/generative-ai/llama-2-fine-tuning
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