Because most probably no one ever tried building a model or try a modelling task using your dataset and you might need a different approach than ML libraries provide.
A simplest different angle or deviation from ML libraries will yield to a research problem.
Figure: A schematic of core principles for AI product development.
Software development is an integral part of ML product development.
However, during research, a code development can go very wild and a scientist, even if they are very good software developers, would end up creating hard to follow and poor code.
Once there is a confidence in reproducibility and robustness of results, the production code should be re-written with high-quality software engineering principles.
Data Standardisation: Release data-sets for research A cold start problem for ML products is to release and design data-sets before even doing any research like work.
This, of course, has to be aligned with industrial requirements.
Imagine datasets like MINST or imagenet for benchmarking.
Released sets will be the first step for any model building or product development, and would constitute a data product themselves.
Data versioning is also a must.
Do not obsess with workflows: All workflows are ad-hocThere is no such thing as a universal or generic workflow.
A workflow depends on a human understanding of processes and steps.
Human understanding is based on language and linguistically there is no such thing as universal language, at least it isnt practical yet c.
f.
, universal grammar.
Loosely defined steps are sufficient for research steps.
However, once it entered into production, then much more strict workflow design might be needed, but be aware all workflows are ad-hoc.
Do not run sprints for core data science Agile principles are suitable for software development innovations.
Sprints or Agile is not suitable for AI research and research environment, it is a different kind of innovation than software engineering.
Thinking that Agile is a cure to do scientific innovation is naive wishful thinking.
Structuring a research group, periodic reviews and releases of the results via presentations and detailed technical reports are much more suitable for data science on top of mini-workshops.
A simple proposal runs can also be made to decide which direction to invest, akin to research proposals.
Feedback loop: Service to Business decision making back to researchA service using ML technologies should produce more data.
The very first service monitoring is A/Null testing, meaning that what would happen in the absence of the AI product.
Detailed analysis of the service data would bring more insights both for business and to research.
Conclusion and outlookThere is no such thing as free-lunch and developing AI products wont be fully automated soon.
Tools may improve the productivity immensely but AI replacing a data scientist or AI scientist is far from reality, at least for now.
If you are investing in AI products, basically you are investing in research at the core, missing that important point may cost organisations a lot.
The basic core principles or variation of them may help in sustaining AI products longer and form your teams accordingly.
Bio: Dr.
Mehmet Suzen is a Theoretical Physicist and Research Scientist.
He blogs on data science at Memos Island.
Original.
Reposted with permission.
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