54 karma · joined April 15, 2021
https://www.whiteowleducation.com
I wrote about this more recently in the context of using LLMs to improve data pipelines. That blog post is at: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/ralphbrooks_bigdata-dataengin...
Having a blog on the front page (coupled with the value that he can bring) should at least give him a few warm leads for job opportunities.
If you are fine-tuning your own LLM, there are other ways to get your idea to appear. In the literature this is sometimes called RLHF or preference optimization, and here are a few approaches:
Direct Preference Optimization
This uses Elo-scores to learn pairwise preferences. Elo is used in chess and basketball to rank individuals who compete in pairs.
@argilla_io on X.com has been doing some work in evaluating DPO.
Here is a decent thread on this: https://x.com/argilla_io/status/1745057571696693689?s=20
Identity Preference Optimization
IPO is research from Google DeepMind. It removes the reliance of Elo scores to address overfitting issues in DPO.
Paper: https://x.com/kylemarieb/status/1728281581306233036?s=20
Kahneman-Tversky Optimization
KTO is an approach that uses mono preference data. For example, it asks if a response is "good or not." This is helpful for a lot of real word situations (e.g. "Is the restaurant well liked?").
Here is a brief discussion on it:
https://x.com/ralphbrooks/status/1744840033872330938?s=20
Here is more on KTO:
* Paper: https://github.com/ContextualAI/HALOs/blob/main/assets/repor...
> Blueprints suck! Not really. Think of Blueprints like python. Its good for routing and keeping track of things at a high level. Think of C++ as handling things at a lower level.
> I heard you need to start with blueprints. Not really. After going through the basic tutorial that Unreal Sensei has on YouTube (https://youtu.be/gQmiqmxJMtA?si=TqBiiIe12M5hiCda) , it is better to do a mix of blueprints and C++ if you have any programming background.
> I don't know what to use for the IDE. I used Rider for Unreal Engine and it has good integration into Unreal Engine.
> So when do you use C++? When I was doing data vis of census data, I needed a way to load in 10,000 data points into memory. The "out of the box" tools for Unreal didn't support this, so custom C++ was the way to go.
> But really, if I just want to get started with Unreal and want official tutorials, where do I go?
After going through Unreal Sensei, I looked at at https://dev.epicgames.com/community/unreal-engine/getting-st..., there are a ton of tutorials there for game developers.
Also, a year ago I put together an online course that looked at how to ramp up on Unreal Engine. The course ("Data Visualization in the Metaverse") is ideal if you already have a programming background. I put the course out on YouTube for free (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKH3Xg62luIgPaB4fiFuT...) and happy to answer any questions about it.
1) For interactive visualizations of data on 3D globes, I use a mix of C++, Python (for data cleaning), and Unreal Engine (with a plugin called Cesium). An example of this is at https://youtu.be/9i-tQ8Sr80o.
2) If I am trying to put together a 3D globe that has less quality but that can be accessed by the web, I use Mapbox GL JS, D3.js, and React. An example of this is at https://www.whiteowleducation.com/blog/2022/10/14/real-estat....
3) I have seen others use Three.js for developing 3D data visualizations on the web. An example of this in a data science context is at https://blog.fastforwardlabs.com/2019/04/29/visualizing-acti....
4) If you are trying to do 3D population density maps in R, there are a lot in the community that say you should use https://www.rayshader.com/ with R.
5) If you are really trying to push the limits of data visualization, follow https://twitter.com/Arti_AR_video . He is doing data vis in AR. Robert Scoble had a good tweet the other day (https://twitter.com/Scobleizer/status/1620498790653501440?) showing Arti with 3D bar charts sitting on a table.
6) If you are doing data vis for urban planning, odds are they are already using ArcGIS, and odds are you will be using something like that.
7) If you are trying to do data vis that relates to architecture, I would actually suggest starting with Twinmotion (which is part of the Unreal Engine ecosystem).
8) If you are trying to do data vis for simulations, it may be worth looking at https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/omniverse/ .
9) If you are wanting to show some high end maps fast, use Geolayers 3. There is a YouTube channel called "Boone Loves Video" (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXyGw2OkrAzLhq1r7hyDZkA). Boone explains Geolayers often in his videos.
10) I personally believe that if you are trying to get to next-gen data visualization my best guess is that you would use a mix of Blender, Nuke, Houdini, or After Effects. I personally have only used Blender and After Effects so far.
Also, if you have any data visualization needs, I am currently on the job market. https://www.linkedin.com/in/ralphbrooks has details about me.
It seems like deep down the author wants an AI tool that summarizes code as a diagram with different “styles” base on roles.
For the tutorial, I took a look at election contributions based on Federal Election Commission data. The numbers seem to align with what is reported in the press (so the analysis seems sound), but feedback is always welcome.
To give some perspective, in a 22 year career, I started out learning Visual Basic, C++, SQL, Java, and databases because those were “hot at the time”, and it was fairly easy to get jobs building out apps with these kind of technologies.
As the web started to gain momentum, I found that again I chased short term goals of doing web development by working with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
After business school, I started to refocus on longer term opportunities. I learned about predictive models, R, Python, Docker, Hadoop, Spark and TensorFlow and applied all of that to data science and machine learning engineering.
These days, I am building a business that teaches people what I have learned over the years with current technology. So here, I have come full circle and have done a lot of React, Node, and Tailwind work to build a website (https://www.whiteowleducation.com) that teaches people how to data visualizations using Python, C++, and Unreal Engine.
Hope this helps.
For example, in the US, recent interest rate hikes led to even larger mortgage rate hikes. The increase in mortgage rates had the effect of making it more difficult for people to afford homes. Once mortgage rates started rising here, I started to see a reduction in homes sold and it has started to lead to a slight reduction in home value.
Before starting a current project, I spend a couple of weeks really thinking through the value that will be created for humanity if the project is completed. Each time a new idea comes up, I put it in the outlines above, but I make it a point to COMPLETE the current project by telling myself about all of the end value that will be created.
If I am writing blogs or if I'm writing scripts, I find that I can dictate much faster and then just edit the sentences afterwards in order to clarify. The process of dictation plus editing is faster for me than if I were to type out everything.
Bottom line: Mavis Beacon helped me code faster, but Microsoft helped me write blogs faster.
If no answer, use reliable hints ( i.e on Twitter) to better inform the initial guess.
Beyond that, the best initial word goes beyond information theory, letter frequency, etc to also be a word that has a realistic chance of being word of the day. As a trivial example, AEIOU may reveal some information on the first guess, but I find it extremely unlikely that you will win Wordle in 1 with this guess.
Without additional context, my guess would be that the Uber driver maybe focused on applications of math and statistics to the insurance industry, but maybe focused more on passing actuarial exams and less on using programming in order to implement the models. Some of the actuarial exams cover finance, statistics, and math; it feels like the driver would be suited to do data science work. It would be interesting to hear more about where the driver is located and whether he/she was only targeting the insurance industry or if that person was looking at other jobs in analytics.
EDIT: I started my business on the premise that universities teach a lot of "fundamentals", but that I don't believe higher education does not do as much as they should to teach the practical "day to day" skills (like data visualization or software version control / git) that are needed to get development work done. My thought is that a couple of online courses can quickly help to bridge the gap between theory and practice.