Using Filters

Using Filters#

Attention: This page relates to the new Flax NNX API.

Filters are used extensively in Flax NNX as a way to create State groups in APIs such as nnx.split, nnx.state, and many of the Flax NNX transforms. For example:

from flax import nnx

class Foo(nnx.Module):
  def __init__(self):
    self.a = nnx.Param(0)
    self.b = nnx.BatchStat(True)

foo = Foo()

graphdef, params, batch_stats = nnx.split(foo, nnx.Param, nnx.BatchStat)

print(f'{params = }')
print(f'{batch_stats = }')

params = State({
  'a': VariableState(
    type=Param,
    value=0
  )
})
batch_stats = State({
  'b': VariableState(
    type=BatchStat,
    value=True
  )
})

Here nnx.Param and nnx.BatchStat are used as Filters to split the model into two groups: one with the parameters and the other with the batch statistics. However, this begs the following questions:

What is a Filter?
Why are types, such as Param or BatchStat, Filters?
How is State grouped / filtered?

The Filter Protocol#

In general Filter are predicate functions of the form:

(path: tuple[Key, ...], value: Any) -> bool

where Key is a hashable and comparable type, path is a tuple of Keys representing the path to the value in a nested structure, and value is the value at the path. The function returns True if the value should be included in the group and False otherwise.

Types are obviously not functions of this form, so the reason why they are treated as Filters is because, as we will see next, types and some other literals are converted to predicates. For example, Param is roughly converted to a predicate like this:

def is_param(path, value) -> bool:
  return isinstance(value, nnx.Param) or (
    hasattr(value, 'type') and issubclass(value.type, nnx.Param)
  )

print(f'{is_param((), nnx.Param(0)) = }')
print(f'{is_param((), nnx.VariableState(type=nnx.Param, value=0)) = }')

is_param((), nnx.Param(0)) = True
is_param((), nnx.VariableState(type=nnx.Param, value=0)) = True

Such function matches any value that is an instance of Param or any value that has a type attribute that is a subclass of Param. Internally Flax NNX uses OfType which defines a callable of this form for a given type:

is_param = nnx.OfType(nnx.Param)

print(f'{is_param((), nnx.Param(0)) = }')
print(f'{is_param((), nnx.VariableState(type=nnx.Param, value=0)) = }')

is_param((), nnx.Param(0)) = True
is_param((), nnx.VariableState(type=nnx.Param, value=0)) = True

The Filter DSL#

To avoid users having to create these functions, Flax NNX exposes a small DSL, formalized as the nnx.filterlib.Filter type, which lets users pass types, booleans, ellipsis, tuples/lists, etc, and converts them to the appropriate predicate internally.

Here is a list of all the callable Filters included in Flax NNX and their DSL literals (when available):

Literal	Callable	Description
`...` or `True`	`Everything()`	Matches all values
`None` or `False`	`Nothing()`	Matches no values
`type`	`OfType(type)`	Matches values that are instances of `type` or have a `type` attribute that is an instance of `type`
	`PathContains(key)`	Matches values that have an associated `path` that contains the given `key`
`'{filter}'` str	`WithTag('{filter}')`	Matches values that have string `tag` attribute equal to `'{filter}'`. Used by `RngKey` and `RngCount`.
`(filters)` tuple or `[filters]` list	`Any(*filters)`	Matches values that match any of the inner `filters`
	`All(*filters)`	Matches values that match all of the inner `filters`
	`Not(filter)`	Matches values that do not match the inner `filter`

Let see the DSL in action with a nnx.vmap example. Lets say we want vectorized all parameters and dropout Rng(Keys|Counts) on the 0th axis, and broadcasted the rest. To do so we can use the following filters:

from functools import partial

@partial(nnx.vmap, in_axes=(None, 0), state_axes={(nnx.Param, 'dropout'): 0, ...: None})
def forward(model, x):
  ...

Here (nnx.Param, 'dropout') expands to Any(OfType(nnx.Param), WithTag('dropout')) and ... expands to Everything().

If you wish to manually convert literal into a predicate to can use nnx.filterlib.to_predicate:

is_param = nnx.filterlib.to_predicate(nnx.Param)
everything = nnx.filterlib.to_predicate(...)
nothing = nnx.filterlib.to_predicate(False)
params_or_dropout = nnx.filterlib.to_predicate((nnx.Param, 'dropout'))

print(f'{is_param = }')
print(f'{everything = }')
print(f'{nothing = }')
print(f'{params_or_dropout = }')

is_param = OfType(<class 'flax.nnx.nnx.variables.Param'>)
everything = Everything()
nothing = Nothing()
params_or_dropout = Any(OfType(<class 'flax.nnx.nnx.variables.Param'>), WithTag('dropout'))

Grouping States#

With the knowledge of Filters at hand, let’s see how nnx.split is roughly implemented. Key ideas:

Use nnx.graph.flatten to get the GraphDef and State representation of the node.
Convert all the filters to predicates.
Use State.flat_state to get the flat representation of the state.
Traverse all the (path, value) pairs in the flat state and group them according to the predicates.
Use State.from_flat_state to convert the flat states to nested States.

from typing import Any
KeyPath = tuple[nnx.graph.Key, ...]

def split(node, *filters):
  graphdef, state, _ = nnx.graph.flatten(node)
  predicates = [nnx.filterlib.to_predicate(f) for f in filters]
  flat_states: list[dict[KeyPath, Any]] = [{} for p in predicates]

  for path, value in state.flat_state().items():
    for i, predicate in enumerate(predicates):
      if predicate(path, value):
        flat_states[i][path] = value
        break
    else:
      raise ValueError(f'No filter matched {path = } {value = }')

  states: tuple[nnx.GraphState, ...] = tuple(
    nnx.State.from_flat_path(flat_state) for flat_state in flat_states
  )
  return graphdef, *states

# lets test it...
foo = Foo()

graphdef, params, batch_stats = split(foo, nnx.Param, nnx.BatchStat)

print(f'{params = }')
print(f'{batch_stats = }')

params = State({
  'a': VariableState(
    type=Param,
    value=0
  )
})
batch_stats = State({
  'b': VariableState(
    type=BatchStat,
    value=True
  )
})

One very important thing to note is that filtering is order-dependent. The first filter that matches a value will keep it, therefore you should place more specific filters before more general filters. For example if we create a SpecialParam type that is a subclass of Param, and a Bar object that contains both types of parameters, if we try to split the Params before the SpecialParams then all the values will be placed in the Param group and the SpecialParam group will be empty because all SpecialParams are also Params:

class SpecialParam(nnx.Param):
  pass

class Bar(nnx.Module):
  def __init__(self):
    self.a = nnx.Param(0)
    self.b = SpecialParam(0)

bar = Bar()

graphdef, params, special_params = split(bar, nnx.Param, SpecialParam) # wrong!
print(f'{params = }')
print(f'{special_params = }')

params = State({
  'a': VariableState(
    type=Param,
    value=0
  ),
  'b': VariableState(
    type=SpecialParam,
    value=0
  )
})
special_params = State({})

Reversing the order will make sure that the SpecialParam are captured first

graphdef, special_params, params = split(bar, SpecialParam, nnx.Param) # correct!
print(f'{params = }')
print(f'{special_params = }')

params = State({
  'a': VariableState(
    type=Param,
    value=0
  )
})
special_params = State({
  'b': VariableState(
    type=SpecialParam,
    value=0
  )
})

Using Filters

Contents

Using Filters#

The Filter Protocol#

The Filter DSL#

Grouping States#