README.md

# nGraph Library [![Build Status][build-status-badge]][build-status]

Welcome to the open-source repository for the **Intel® nGraph Library**. Our code 
base provides a Compiler and runtime suite of tools (APIs) designed to give 
developers maximum flexibility for their software design, allowing them to 
create or customize a scalable solution using any framework while also avoiding 
device-level hardware lock-in that is so common with many AI vendors. A neural 
network model compiled with nGraph can run on any of our currently-supported 
backends, and it will be able to run on any backends we support in the future 
with minimal disruption to your model. With nGraph, you can co-evolve your 
software and hardware's capabilities to stay at the forefront of your industry. 

![nGraph ecosystem][ngraph-ecosystem]

The **nGraph Compiler** is Intel's graph compiler for Artificial Neural Networks. 
Documentation in this repo describes how you can program any framework 
to run training and inference computations on a variety of Backends including 
Intel® Architecture Processors (CPUs), Intel® Nervana™ Neural Network Processors 
(NNPs), cuDNN-compatible graphics cards (GPUs), custom VPUs like [Movidius], and
many others. The default CPU Backend also provides an interactive *Interpreter* 
mode that can be used to zero in on a DL model and create custom nGraph 
optimizations that can be used to further accelerate training or inference, in 
whatever scenario you need.  

nGraph provides both  a C++ API for framework developers and a Python API which 
can run inference on models imported from ONNX. 

See the [Release Notes] for recent changes.


|  Framework     | bridge available? | ONNX support?  |
|----------------|-------------------|----------------|
| TensorFlow*    | yes               | yes            |
| MXNet*         | yes               | yes            |
| PaddlePaddle   | yes               | yes            |   
| PyTorch*       | no                | yes            |
| Chainer*       | no                | yes            |
| CNTK*          | no                | yes            |
| Caffe2*        | no                | yes            |


| Backend                                       | current support   | future support |
|-----------------------------------------------|-------------------|----------------|
| Intel® Architecture CPU                       | yes               | yes            |
| Intel® Nervana™ Neural Network Processor (NNP)| yes               | yes            |
| Intel [Movidius™ Myriad™ 2] VPUs              | coming soon       | yes            |
| Intel® Architecture GPUs                      | via PlaidML       | yes            |
| AMD* GPUs                                     | via PlaidML       | yes            |
| NVIDIA* GPUs                                  | via PlaidML       | some           | 
| Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGA)         | no                | yes            |


## Documentation

See our [install] docs for how to get started.

For this early release, we provide [framework integration guides] to
compile MXNet and TensorFlow-based projects. If you already have a
trained model, we've put together a getting started guide for
[how to import] a deep learning model and start working with the nGraph
APIs.

## Support

Please submit your questions, feature requests and bug reports via
[GitHub issues].

## How to Contribute

We welcome community contributions to nGraph. If you have an idea how
to improve the Library:

* See the [contrib guide] for code formatting and style guidelines.
* Share your proposal via [GitHub issues].
* Ensure you can build the product and run all the examples with your patch.
* In the case of a larger feature, create a test.
* Submit a [pull request].
* Make sure your PR passes all CI tests. Note: our [Travis-CI][build-status] service
  runs only on a CPU backend on Linux. We will run additional tests
  in other environments.
* We will review your contribution and, if any additional fixes or
  modifications are necessary, may provide feedback to guide you. When
  accepted, your pull request will be merged to the repository.

[install]: http://ngraph.nervanasys.com/docs/latest/buildlb.html
[framework integration guides]: http://ngraph.nervanasys.com/docs/latest/framework-integration-guides.html
[release notes]: http://ngraph.nervanasys.com/docs/latest/project/release-notes.html
[Github issues]: https://github.com/NervanaSystems/ngraph/issues
[contrib guide]: http://ngraph.nervanasys.com/docs/latest/project/code-contributor-README.html
[pull request]: https://github.com/NervanaSystems/ngraph/pulls
[how to import]: http://ngraph.nervanasys.com/docs/latest/howto/import.html
[ngraph-ecosystem]: doc/sphinx/source/graphics/599px-Intel-ngraph-ecosystem.png "nGraph Ecosystem"
[build-status]: https://travis-ci.org/NervanaSystems/ngraph/branches
[build-status-badge]: https://travis-ci.org/NervanaSystems/ngraph.svg?branch=master
[develop-without-lockin]: doc/sphinx/source/graphics/develop-without-lockin.png "Develop on any part of the stack wtihout lockin"
[Movidius™ Myriad™ 2]:https://www.movidius.com/solutions/vision-processing-unit