For a more recent implementation please take a look at the pytorch branch.

We propose distributed deep neural networks (DDNNs) over distributed computing hierarchies, consisting of the cloud, the edge (fog) and end devices. While being able to accommodate inference of a deep neural network (DNN) in the cloud, a DDNN also allows fast and localized inference using shallow portions of the neural network at the edge and end devices. Due to its distributed nature, DDNNs enhance data privacy and system fault tolerance for DNN applications. When supported by a scalable distributed computing hierarchy, a DDNN can scale up in neural network size and scale out in geographical span. In implementing a DDNN, we map sections of a DNN onto a distributed computing hierarchy. By jointly training these sections, we minimize communication and resource usage for devices and maximize usefulness of extracted features which are utilized in the cloud. As a proof of concept, we show a DDNN can exploit geographical diversity of sensors to improve recognition accuracy and reduce communication cost. In our experiment, compared with the traditional method of offloading raw sensor data to be processed in the cloud, DDNN locally processes most sensor data on end devices and is able to reduce the communication cost by a factor of over 20x.

This library is dependent on Python 2.7+ and Chainer. Please install Chainer 1.17+ before starting.

pip install chainer

Our paper is available here

If you use this model or codebase, please cite:

@article{teerapittayanondistributed,
  title={Distributed Deep Neural Networks over the Cloud, the Edge and End Devices},
  author={Teerapittayanon, Surat and McDanel, Bradley and Kung, HT},
  jornal={Proceedings of the 37th IEEE International Conference on Distributed Computing Systems},
  year={2017}
}

Copyright (c) 2017 Bradley McDanel, Surat Teerapittayanon, HT Kung, Harvard University

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