Using the SavedModel format

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A SavedModel contains a complete TensorFlow program, including weights and computation. It does not require the original model building code to run, which makes it useful for sharing or deploying (with TFLite, TensorFlow.js, TensorFlow Serving, or TensorFlow Hub).

This document dives into some of the details of how to use the low-level tf.saved_model api:

• If you are using a tf.keras.Model the keras.Model.save(output_path) method may be all you need: See the Keras save and serialize

• If you just want to save/load weights during training see the guide to training checkpoints.

Creating a SavedModel from Keras

For a quick introduction, this section exports a pre-trained Keras model and serves image classification requests with it. The rest of the guide will fill in details and discuss other ways to create SavedModels.

from __future__ import absolute_import, division, print_function, unicode_literals
import tensorflow as tf
from matplotlib import pyplot as plt
import numpy as np

physical_devices = tf.config.experimental.list_physical_devices('GPU')
if physical_devices:
  tf.config.experimental.set_memory_growth(physical_devices[0], True)

file = tf.keras.utils.get_file(
    "grace_hopper.jpg",
    "https://storage.googleapis.com/download.tensorflow.org/example_images/grace_hopper.jpg")
img = tf.keras.preprocessing.image.load_img(file, target_size=[224, 224])
plt.imshow(img)
plt.axis('off')
x = tf.keras.preprocessing.image.img_to_array(img)
x = tf.keras.applications.mobilenet.preprocess_input(
    x[tf.newaxis,...])

Downloading data from https://storage.googleapis.com/download.tensorflow.org/example_images/grace_hopper.jpg
65536/61306 [================================] - 0s 0us/step

We'll use an image of Grace Hopper as a running example, and a Keras pre-trained image classification model since it's easy to use. Custom models work too, and are covered in detail later.

labels_path = tf.keras.utils.get_file(
    'ImageNetLabels.txt',
    'https://storage.googleapis.com/download.tensorflow.org/data/ImageNetLabels.txt')
imagenet_labels = np.array(open(labels_path).read().splitlines())

Downloading data from https://storage.googleapis.com/download.tensorflow.org/data/ImageNetLabels.txt
16384/10484 [==============================================] - 0s 0us/step

pretrained_model = tf.keras.applications.MobileNet()
result_before_save = pretrained_model(x)

decoded = imagenet_labels[np.argsort(result_before_save)[0,::-1][:5]+1]

print("Result before saving:\n", decoded)

Downloading data from https://github.com/fchollet/deep-learning-models/releases/download/v0.6/mobilenet_1_0_224_tf.h5
17227776/17225924 [==============================] - 2s 0us/step
Result before saving:
 ['military uniform' 'bow tie' 'suit' 'bearskin' 'pickelhaube']

The top prediction for this image is "military uniform".

tf.saved_model.save(pretrained_model, "/tmp/mobilenet/1/")

WARNING:tensorflow:From /tmpfs/src/tf_docs_env/lib/python3.6/site-packages/tensorflow_core/python/ops/resource_variable_ops.py:1786: calling BaseResourceVariable.__init__ (from tensorflow.python.ops.resource_variable_ops) with constraint is deprecated and will be removed in a future version.
Instructions for updating:
If using Keras pass *_constraint arguments to layers.
INFO:tensorflow:Assets written to: /tmp/mobilenet/1/assets

The save-path follows a convention used by TensorFlow Serving where the last path component (1/ here) is a version number for your model - it allows tools like Tensorflow Serving to reason about the relative freshness.

SavedModels have named functions called signatures. Keras models export their forward pass under the serving_default signature key. The SavedModel command line interface is useful for inspecting SavedModels on disk:

saved_model_cli show --dir /tmp/mobilenet/1 --tag_set serve --signature_def serving_default

2019-12-21 03:01:51.617484: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libnvinfer.so.6
2019-12-21 03:01:51.617788: W tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:55] Could not load dynamic library 'libnvinfer_plugin.so.6'; dlerror: libnvinfer_plugin.so.6: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
2019-12-21 03:01:51.617815: W tensorflow/compiler/tf2tensorrt/utils/py_utils.cc:30] Cannot dlopen some TensorRT libraries. If you would like to use Nvidia GPU with TensorRT, please make sure the missing libraries mentioned above are installed properly.
The given SavedModel SignatureDef contains the following input(s):
  inputs['input_1'] tensor_info:
      dtype: DT_FLOAT
      shape: (-1, 224, 224, 3)
      name: serving_default_input_1:0
The given SavedModel SignatureDef contains the following output(s):
  outputs['act_softmax'] tensor_info:
      dtype: DT_FLOAT
      shape: (-1, 1000)
      name: StatefulPartitionedCall:0
Method name is: tensorflow/serving/predict

We can load the SavedModel back into Python with tf.saved_model.load and see how Admiral Hopper's image is classified.

loaded = tf.saved_model.load("/tmp/mobilenet/1/")
print(list(loaded.signatures.keys()))  # ["serving_default"]

['serving_default']

Imported signatures always return dictionaries.

infer = loaded.signatures["serving_default"]
print(infer.structured_outputs)

{'act_softmax': TensorSpec(shape=(None, 1000), dtype=tf.float32, name='act_softmax')}

Running inference from the SavedModel gives the same result as the original model.

labeling = infer(tf.constant(x))[pretrained_model.output_names[0]]

decoded = imagenet_labels[np.argsort(labeling)[0,::-1][:5]+1]

print("Result after saving and loading:\n", decoded)

Result after saving and loading:
 ['military uniform' 'bow tie' 'suit' 'bearskin' 'pickelhaube']

Running a SavedModel in TensorFlow Serving

SavedModels are usable from Python (more on that below), but production environments typically use a dedicated service for inference without running Python code. This is easy to set up from a SavedModel using TensorFlow Serving.

See the TensorFlow Serving REST tutorial for more details about serving, including instructions for installing tensorflow_model_server in a notebook or on your local machine. As a quick sketch, to serve the mobilenet model exported above just point the model server at the SavedModel directory:

nohup tensorflow_model_server \
  --rest_api_port=8501 \
  --model_name=mobilenet \
  --model_base_path="/tmp/mobilenet" >server.log 2>&1

Then send a request.

!pip install -q requests
import json
import numpy
import requests
data = json.dumps({"signature_name": "serving_default",
                   "instances": x.tolist()})
headers = {"content-type": "application/json"}
json_response = requests.post('http://localhost:8501/v1/models/mobilenet:predict',
                              data=data, headers=headers)
predictions = numpy.array(json.loads(json_response.text)["predictions"])

The resulting predictions are identical to the results from Python.

The SavedModel format on disk

A SavedModel is a directory containing serialized signatures and the state needed to run them, including variable values and vocabularies.

ls /tmp/mobilenet/1

assets  saved_model.pb  variables

The saved_model.pb file stores the actual TensorFlow program, or model, and a set of named signatures, each identifying a function that accepts tensor inputs and produces tensor outputs.

SavedModels may contain multiple variants of the model (multiple v1.MetaGraphDefs, identified with the --tag_set flag to saved_model_cli), but this is rare. APIs which create multiple variants of a model include tf.Estimator.experimental_export_all_saved_models and in TensorFlow 1.x tf.saved_model.Builder.

saved_model_cli show --dir /tmp/mobilenet/1 --tag_set serve

2019-12-21 03:01:57.454810: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libnvinfer.so.6
2019-12-21 03:01:57.455109: W tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:55] Could not load dynamic library 'libnvinfer_plugin.so.6'; dlerror: libnvinfer_plugin.so.6: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
2019-12-21 03:01:57.455132: W tensorflow/compiler/tf2tensorrt/utils/py_utils.cc:30] Cannot dlopen some TensorRT libraries. If you would like to use Nvidia GPU with TensorRT, please make sure the missing libraries mentioned above are installed properly.
The given SavedModel MetaGraphDef contains SignatureDefs with the following keys:
SignatureDef key: "__saved_model_init_op"
SignatureDef key: "serving_default"

The variables directory contains a standard training checkpoint (see the guide to training checkpoints).

ls /tmp/mobilenet/1/variables

variables.data-00000-of-00002  variables.data-00001-of-00002  variables.index

The assets directory contains files used by the TensorFlow graph, for example text files used to initialize vocabulary tables. It is unused in this example.

SavedModels may have an assets.extra directory for any files not used by the TensorFlow graph, for example information for consumers about what to do with the SavedModel. TensorFlow itself does not use this directory.

Exporting custom models

In the first section, tf.saved_model.save automatically determined a signature for the tf.keras.Model object. This worked because Keras Model objects have an unambiguous method to export and known input shapes. tf.saved_model.save works just as well with low-level model building APIs, but you will need to indicate which function to use as a signature if you're planning to serve a model.

class CustomModule(tf.Module):

  def __init__(self):
    super(CustomModule, self).__init__()
    self.v = tf.Variable(1.)

  @tf.function
  def __call__(self, x):
    return x * self.v

  @tf.function(input_signature=[tf.TensorSpec([], tf.float32)])
  def mutate(self, new_v):
    self.v.assign(new_v)

module = CustomModule()

This module has two methods decorated with tf.function. While these functions will be included in the SavedModel and available if the SavedModel is reloaded via tf.saved_model.load into a Python program, without explicitly declaring the serving signature tools like Tensorflow Serving and saved_model_cli cannot access them.

The mutate method has a declared input_signature, and so there is enough information to save its computation graph in the SavedModel already. The __call__ method has no declared signature, and so its signature(s) are inferred from how it has been used before saving: Calling the method one or more times will create computation graphs for each particular combination of the tensor shapes and dtypes seen in the arguments. (The tf.function tutorial calls that tracing the function.)

module(tf.constant(0.))
tf.saved_model.save(module, "/tmp/module_no_signatures")

INFO:tensorflow:Assets written to: /tmp/module_no_signatures/assets

For functions without an input_signature, any input shapes used before saving will be available after loading. Since we called __call__ with just a scalar, it will accept only scalar values.

imported = tf.saved_model.load("/tmp/module_no_signatures")
assert 3. == imported(tf.constant(3.)).numpy()
imported.mutate(tf.constant(2.))
assert 6. == imported(tf.constant(3.)).numpy()

The function will not accept new shapes like vectors.

imported(tf.constant([3.]))

ValueError: Could not find matching function to call for canonicalized inputs ((,), {}). Only existing signatures are [((TensorSpec(shape=(), dtype=tf.float32, name=u'x'),), {})].

get_concrete_function lets you add input shapes to a function without calling it. It takes tf.TensorSpec objects in place of Tensor arguments, indicating the shapes and dtypes of inputs. Shapes can either be None, indicating that any shape is acceptable, or a list of axis sizes. If an axis size is None then any size is acceptable for that axis. (This is often used for batch size.) tf.TensorSpecs can also have names, which default to the function's argument keywords ("x" here).

module.__call__.get_concrete_function(x=tf.TensorSpec([None], tf.float32))
tf.saved_model.save(module, "/tmp/module_no_signatures")
imported = tf.saved_model.load("/tmp/module_no_signatures")
assert [3.] == imported(tf.constant([3.])).numpy()

INFO:tensorflow:Assets written to: /tmp/module_no_signatures/assets

We didn't identify any of the functions we exported as a signature, so it has none.

saved_model_cli show --dir /tmp/module_no_signatures --tag_set serve

2019-12-21 03:02:00.320206: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libnvinfer.so.6
2019-12-21 03:02:00.320483: W tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:55] Could not load dynamic library 'libnvinfer_plugin.so.6'; dlerror: libnvinfer_plugin.so.6: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
2019-12-21 03:02:00.320503: W tensorflow/compiler/tf2tensorrt/utils/py_utils.cc:30] Cannot dlopen some TensorRT libraries. If you would like to use Nvidia GPU with TensorRT, please make sure the missing libraries mentioned above are installed properly.
The given SavedModel MetaGraphDef contains SignatureDefs with the following keys:
SignatureDef key: "__saved_model_init_op"

Identifying a signature to export

To indicate that a function should be a signature, specify the signatures argument when saving.

call = module.__call__.get_concrete_function(tf.TensorSpec(None, tf.float32))
tf.saved_model.save(module, "/tmp/module_with_signature", signatures=call)

INFO:tensorflow:Assets written to: /tmp/module_with_signature/assets

Notice that we first converted the tf.function to a ConcreteFunction with get_concrete_function. This is necessary because the function was created without a fixed input_signature, and so did not have a definite set of Tensor inputs associated with it.

saved_model_cli show --dir /tmp/module_with_signature --tag_set serve --signature_def serving_default

2019-12-21 03:02:02.734185: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libnvinfer.so.6
2019-12-21 03:02:02.734451: W tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:55] Could not load dynamic library 'libnvinfer_plugin.so.6'; dlerror: libnvinfer_plugin.so.6: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
2019-12-21 03:02:02.734471: W tensorflow/compiler/tf2tensorrt/utils/py_utils.cc:30] Cannot dlopen some TensorRT libraries. If you would like to use Nvidia GPU with TensorRT, please make sure the missing libraries mentioned above are installed properly.
The given SavedModel SignatureDef contains the following input(s):
  inputs['x'] tensor_info:
      dtype: DT_FLOAT
      shape: unknown_rank
      name: serving_default_x:0
The given SavedModel SignatureDef contains the following output(s):
  outputs['output_0'] tensor_info:
      dtype: DT_FLOAT
      shape: unknown_rank
      name: StatefulPartitionedCall:0
Method name is: tensorflow/serving/predict

imported = tf.saved_model.load("/tmp/module_with_signature")
signature = imported.signatures["serving_default"]
assert [3.] == signature(x=tf.constant([3.]))["output_0"].numpy()
imported.mutate(tf.constant(2.))
assert [6.] == signature(x=tf.constant([3.]))["output_0"].numpy()
assert 2. == imported.v.numpy()

We exported a single signature, and its key defaulted to "serving_default". To export multiple signatures, pass a dictionary.

@tf.function(input_signature=[tf.TensorSpec([], tf.string)])
def parse_string(string_input):
  return imported(tf.strings.to_number(string_input))

signatures = {"serving_default": parse_string,
              "from_float": imported.signatures["serving_default"]}

tf.saved_model.save(imported, "/tmp/module_with_multiple_signatures", signatures)

INFO:tensorflow:Assets written to: /tmp/module_with_multiple_signatures/assets

saved_model_cli show --dir /tmp/module_with_multiple_signatures --tag_set serve

2019-12-21 03:02:05.241099: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libnvinfer.so.6
2019-12-21 03:02:05.241356: W tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:55] Could not load dynamic library 'libnvinfer_plugin.so.6'; dlerror: libnvinfer_plugin.so.6: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
2019-12-21 03:02:05.241375: W tensorflow/compiler/tf2tensorrt/utils/py_utils.cc:30] Cannot dlopen some TensorRT libraries. If you would like to use Nvidia GPU with TensorRT, please make sure the missing libraries mentioned above are installed properly.
The given SavedModel MetaGraphDef contains SignatureDefs with the following keys:
SignatureDef key: "__saved_model_init_op"
SignatureDef key: "from_float"
SignatureDef key: "serving_default"

saved_model_cli can also run SavedModels directly from the command line.

saved_model_cli run --dir /tmp/module_with_multiple_signatures --tag_set serve --signature_def serving_default --input_exprs="string_input='3.'"
saved_model_cli run --dir /tmp/module_with_multiple_signatures --tag_set serve --signature_def from_float --input_exprs="x=3."

2019-12-21 03:02:07.566129: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libnvinfer.so.6
2019-12-21 03:02:07.566432: W tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:55] Could not load dynamic library 'libnvinfer_plugin.so.6'; dlerror: libnvinfer_plugin.so.6: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
2019-12-21 03:02:07.566454: W tensorflow/compiler/tf2tensorrt/utils/py_utils.cc:30] Cannot dlopen some TensorRT libraries. If you would like to use Nvidia GPU with TensorRT, please make sure the missing libraries mentioned above are installed properly.
2019-12-21 03:02:08.488896: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcuda.so.1
2019-12-21 03:02:08.496240: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:08.496754: I tensorflow/core/common_runtime/gpu/gpu_device.cc:1555] Found device 0 with properties: 
pciBusID: 0000:00:05.0 name: Tesla V100-SXM2-16GB computeCapability: 7.0
coreClock: 1.53GHz coreCount: 80 deviceMemorySize: 15.78GiB deviceMemoryBandwidth: 836.37GiB/s
2019-12-21 03:02:08.496798: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcudart.so.10.1
2019-12-21 03:02:08.496839: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcublas.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:08.498740: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcufft.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:08.499124: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcurand.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:08.501225: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcusolver.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:08.502406: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcusparse.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:08.502463: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcudnn.so.7
2019-12-21 03:02:08.502558: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:08.503074: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:08.503507: I tensorflow/core/common_runtime/gpu/gpu_device.cc:1697] Adding visible gpu devices: 0
2019-12-21 03:02:08.503791: I tensorflow/core/platform/cpu_feature_guard.cc:142] Your CPU supports instructions that this TensorFlow binary was not compiled to use: AVX2 AVX512F FMA
2019-12-21 03:02:08.510769: I tensorflow/core/platform/profile_utils/cpu_utils.cc:94] CPU Frequency: 2000160000 Hz
2019-12-21 03:02:08.511363: I tensorflow/compiler/xla/service/service.cc:168] XLA service 0x4863680 initialized for platform Host (this does not guarantee that XLA will be used). Devices:
2019-12-21 03:02:08.511403: I tensorflow/compiler/xla/service/service.cc:176]   StreamExecutor device (0): Host, Default Version
2019-12-21 03:02:08.604088: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:08.604658: I tensorflow/compiler/xla/service/service.cc:168] XLA service 0x48e94d0 initialized for platform CUDA (this does not guarantee that XLA will be used). Devices:
2019-12-21 03:02:08.604693: I tensorflow/compiler/xla/service/service.cc:176]   StreamExecutor device (0): Tesla V100-SXM2-16GB, Compute Capability 7.0
2019-12-21 03:02:08.604937: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:08.605458: I tensorflow/core/common_runtime/gpu/gpu_device.cc:1555] Found device 0 with properties: 
pciBusID: 0000:00:05.0 name: Tesla V100-SXM2-16GB computeCapability: 7.0
coreClock: 1.53GHz coreCount: 80 deviceMemorySize: 15.78GiB deviceMemoryBandwidth: 836.37GiB/s
2019-12-21 03:02:08.605506: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcudart.so.10.1
2019-12-21 03:02:08.605523: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcublas.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:08.605554: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcufft.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:08.605572: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcurand.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:08.605586: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcusolver.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:08.605602: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcusparse.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:08.605615: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcudnn.so.7
2019-12-21 03:02:08.605678: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:08.606164: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:08.606612: I tensorflow/core/common_runtime/gpu/gpu_device.cc:1697] Adding visible gpu devices: 0
2019-12-21 03:02:08.606672: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcudart.so.10.1
2019-12-21 03:02:08.914693: I tensorflow/core/common_runtime/gpu/gpu_device.cc:1096] Device interconnect StreamExecutor with strength 1 edge matrix:
2019-12-21 03:02:08.914749: I tensorflow/core/common_runtime/gpu/gpu_device.cc:1102]      0 
2019-12-21 03:02:08.914765: I tensorflow/core/common_runtime/gpu/gpu_device.cc:1115] 0:   N 
2019-12-21 03:02:08.915014: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:08.915591: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:08.916129: I tensorflow/core/common_runtime/gpu/gpu_device.cc:1241] Created TensorFlow device (/job:localhost/replica:0/task:0/device:GPU:0 with 6670 MB memory) -> physical GPU (device: 0, name: Tesla V100-SXM2-16GB, pci bus id: 0000:00:05.0, compute capability: 7.0)
WARNING:tensorflow:From /tmpfs/src/tf_docs_env/lib/python3.6/site-packages/tensorflow_core/python/tools/saved_model_cli.py:420: load (from tensorflow.python.saved_model.loader_impl) is deprecated and will be removed in a future version.
Instructions for updating:
This function will only be available through the v1 compatibility library as tf.compat.v1.saved_model.loader.load or tf.compat.v1.saved_model.load. There will be a new function for importing SavedModels in Tensorflow 2.0.
Result for output key output_0:
6.0
2019-12-21 03:02:11.022142: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libnvinfer.so.6
2019-12-21 03:02:11.022387: W tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:55] Could not load dynamic library 'libnvinfer_plugin.so.6'; dlerror: libnvinfer_plugin.so.6: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
2019-12-21 03:02:11.022405: W tensorflow/compiler/tf2tensorrt/utils/py_utils.cc:30] Cannot dlopen some TensorRT libraries. If you would like to use Nvidia GPU with TensorRT, please make sure the missing libraries mentioned above are installed properly.
2019-12-21 03:02:11.860115: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcuda.so.1
2019-12-21 03:02:11.867464: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:11.868000: I tensorflow/core/common_runtime/gpu/gpu_device.cc:1555] Found device 0 with properties: 
pciBusID: 0000:00:05.0 name: Tesla V100-SXM2-16GB computeCapability: 7.0
coreClock: 1.53GHz coreCount: 80 deviceMemorySize: 15.78GiB deviceMemoryBandwidth: 836.37GiB/s
2019-12-21 03:02:11.868047: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcudart.so.10.1
2019-12-21 03:02:11.868089: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcublas.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:11.869856: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcufft.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:11.870216: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcurand.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:11.872280: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcusolver.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:11.873431: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcusparse.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:11.873504: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcudnn.so.7
2019-12-21 03:02:11.873601: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:11.874123: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:11.874611: I tensorflow/core/common_runtime/gpu/gpu_device.cc:1697] Adding visible gpu devices: 0
2019-12-21 03:02:11.874895: I tensorflow/core/platform/cpu_feature_guard.cc:142] Your CPU supports instructions that this TensorFlow binary was not compiled to use: AVX2 AVX512F FMA
2019-12-21 03:02:11.882687: I tensorflow/core/platform/profile_utils/cpu_utils.cc:94] CPU Frequency: 2000160000 Hz
2019-12-21 03:02:11.883474: I tensorflow/compiler/xla/service/service.cc:168] XLA service 0x4669400 initialized for platform Host (this does not guarantee that XLA will be used). Devices:
2019-12-21 03:02:11.883503: I tensorflow/compiler/xla/service/service.cc:176]   StreamExecutor device (0): Host, Default Version
2019-12-21 03:02:11.975035: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:11.975670: I tensorflow/compiler/xla/service/service.cc:168] XLA service 0x46ef250 initialized for platform CUDA (this does not guarantee that XLA will be used). Devices:
2019-12-21 03:02:11.975710: I tensorflow/compiler/xla/service/service.cc:176]   StreamExecutor device (0): Tesla V100-SXM2-16GB, Compute Capability 7.0
2019-12-21 03:02:11.975975: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:11.976471: I tensorflow/core/common_runtime/gpu/gpu_device.cc:1555] Found device 0 with properties: 
pciBusID: 0000:00:05.0 name: Tesla V100-SXM2-16GB computeCapability: 7.0
coreClock: 1.53GHz coreCount: 80 deviceMemorySize: 15.78GiB deviceMemoryBandwidth: 836.37GiB/s
2019-12-21 03:02:11.976522: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcudart.so.10.1
2019-12-21 03:02:11.976552: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcublas.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:11.976600: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcufft.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:11.976619: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcurand.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:11.976640: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcusolver.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:11.976659: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcusparse.so.10
2019-12-21 03:02:11.976675: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcudnn.so.7
2019-12-21 03:02:11.976753: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:11.977229: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:11.977657: I tensorflow/core/common_runtime/gpu/gpu_device.cc:1697] Adding visible gpu devices: 0
2019-12-21 03:02:11.977709: I tensorflow/stream_executor/platform/default/dso_loader.cc:44] Successfully opened dynamic library libcudart.so.10.1
2019-12-21 03:02:12.258175: I tensorflow/core/common_runtime/gpu/gpu_device.cc:1096] Device interconnect StreamExecutor with strength 1 edge matrix:
2019-12-21 03:02:12.258240: I tensorflow/core/common_runtime/gpu/gpu_device.cc:1102]      0 
2019-12-21 03:02:12.258249: I tensorflow/core/common_runtime/gpu/gpu_device.cc:1115] 0:   N 
2019-12-21 03:02:12.258459: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:12.259347: I tensorflow/stream_executor/cuda/cuda_gpu_executor.cc:981] successful NUMA node read from SysFS had negative value (-1), but there must be at least one NUMA node, so returning NUMA node zero
2019-12-21 03:02:12.259806: I tensorflow/core/common_runtime/gpu/gpu_device.cc:1241] Created TensorFlow device (/job:localhost/replica:0/task:0/device:GPU:0 with 6670 MB memory) -> physical GPU (device: 0, name: Tesla V100-SXM2-16GB, pci bus id: 0000:00:05.0, compute capability: 7.0)
WARNING:tensorflow:From /tmpfs/src/tf_docs_env/lib/python3.6/site-packages/tensorflow_core/python/tools/saved_model_cli.py:420: load (from tensorflow.python.saved_model.loader_impl) is deprecated and will be removed in a future version.
Instructions for updating:
This function will only be available through the v1 compatibility library as tf.compat.v1.saved_model.loader.load or tf.compat.v1.saved_model.load. There will be a new function for importing SavedModels in Tensorflow 2.0.
Result for output key output_0:
6.0

Reusing SavedModels in Python

Let us look again at class CustomModule above, and how module objects of this type were saved as SavedModels and loaded back. Did you notice the call to module(...) without the use of signatures?

Calling tf.saved_model.save(obj, '/path') on objects derived from tf.keras.Model or tf.Module saves tf.Variable attributes as described in the training checkpoints tutorial: obj and, recursively, the objects referenced by its attributes are traversed and the tf.Variable attributes found on those objects have their current values saved. Likewise, the tf.function-decorated methods found on those objects have their computation graphs saved. However, the original Python types, Python code of methods, and Python-valued data members are lost.

Calling obj = tf.saved_model.load('/path') restores the saved objects (now reduced to a placeholder type), their tf.Variable attributes with their respective saved values, and their tf.function-decorated methods. Those methods can be called as before, as long as a computation graph has been saved that covers the combination of Tensor shapes and non-Tensor values used in the call. Retracing the tf.function from Python code is no longer possible and will raise an exception.

The restored tf.functions provide a richer, more Pythonic API to the restored model than the concrete functions in the .signatures dict. However, this API is inaccessible to the non-Python environments that rely on signatures.

Basic fine-tuning

Variable objects are available, and we can backprop through imported functions. That is enough to fine-tune (i.e. retrain) a SavedModel in simple cases.

optimizer = tf.optimizers.SGD(0.05)

def train_step():
  with tf.GradientTape() as tape:
    loss = (10. - imported(tf.constant(2.))) ** 2
  variables = tape.watched_variables()
  grads = tape.gradient(loss, variables)
  optimizer.apply_gradients(zip(grads, variables))
  return loss

for _ in range(10):
  # "v" approaches 5, "loss" approaches 0
  print("loss={:.2f} v={:.2f}".format(train_step(), imported.v.numpy()))

loss=36.00 v=3.20
loss=12.96 v=3.92
loss=4.67 v=4.35
loss=1.68 v=4.61
loss=0.60 v=4.77
loss=0.22 v=4.86
loss=0.08 v=4.92
loss=0.03 v=4.95
loss=0.01 v=4.97
loss=0.00 v=4.98

General fine-tuning

A SavedModel from Keras provides more details than a plain __call__ to address more advanced cases of fine-tuning. TensorFlow Hub recommends to provide the following of those, if applicable, in SavedModels shared for the purpose of fine-tuning:

• If the model uses dropout or another technique in which the forward pass differs between training and inference (like batch normalization), the __call__ method takes an optional, Python-valued training= argument that defaults to False but can be set to True.
• Next to the __call__ attribute, there are .variable and .trainable_variable attributes with the corresponding lists of variables. A variable that was originally trainable but is meant to be frozen during fine-tuning is omitted from .trainable_variables.
• For the sake of frameworks like Keras that represent weight regularizers as attributes of layers or sub-models, there can also be a .regularization_losses attribute. It holds a list of zero-argument functions whose values are meant for addition to the total loss.

Going back to the initial MobileNet example, we can see some of those in action:

loaded = tf.saved_model.load("/tmp/mobilenet/1/")
print("MobileNet has {} trainable variables: {}, ...".format(
          len(loaded.trainable_variables),
          ", ".join([v.name for v in loaded.trainable_variables[:5]])))

MobileNet has 83 trainable variables: conv1/kernel:0, conv1_bn/gamma:0, conv1_bn/beta:0, conv_dw_1/depthwise_kernel:0, conv_dw_1_bn/gamma:0, ...

trainable_variable_ids = {id(v) for v in loaded.trainable_variables}
non_trainable_variables = [v for v in loaded.variables
                           if id(v) not in trainable_variable_ids]
print("MobileNet also has {} non-trainable variables: {}, ...".format(
          len(non_trainable_variables),
          ", ".join([v.name for v in non_trainable_variables[:3]])))

MobileNet also has 54 non-trainable variables: conv1_bn/moving_mean:0, conv1_bn/moving_variance:0, conv_dw_1_bn/moving_mean:0, ...

Control flow in SavedModels

Anything that can go in a tf.function can go in a SavedModel. With AutoGraph this includes conditional logic which depends on Tensors, specified with regular Python control flow.

@tf.function(input_signature=[tf.TensorSpec([], tf.int32)])
def control_flow(x):
  if x < 0:
    tf.print("Invalid!")
  else:
    tf.print(x % 3)

to_export = tf.Module()
to_export.control_flow = control_flow
tf.saved_model.save(to_export, "/tmp/control_flow")

INFO:tensorflow:Assets written to: /tmp/control_flow/assets

imported = tf.saved_model.load("/tmp/control_flow")
imported.control_flow(tf.constant(-1))  # Invalid!
imported.control_flow(tf.constant(2))   # 2
imported.control_flow(tf.constant(3))   # 0

Invalid!
2
0

SavedModels from Estimators

Estimators export SavedModels through tf.Estimator.export_saved_model. See the guide to Estimator for details.

input_column = tf.feature_column.numeric_column("x")
estimator = tf.estimator.LinearClassifier(feature_columns=[input_column])

def input_fn():
  return tf.data.Dataset.from_tensor_slices(
    ({"x": [1., 2., 3., 4.]}, [1, 1, 0, 0])).repeat(200).shuffle(64).batch(16)
estimator.train(input_fn)

serving_input_fn = tf.estimator.export.build_parsing_serving_input_receiver_fn(
  tf.feature_column.make_parse_example_spec([input_column]))
export_path = estimator.export_saved_model(
  "/tmp/from_estimator/", serving_input_fn)

INFO:tensorflow:Using default config.
WARNING:tensorflow:Using temporary folder as model directory: /tmp/tmpa3lzvfyt
INFO:tensorflow:Using config: {'_model_dir': '/tmp/tmpa3lzvfyt', '_tf_random_seed': None, '_save_summary_steps': 100, '_save_checkpoints_steps': None, '_save_checkpoints_secs': 600, '_session_config': allow_soft_placement: true
graph_options {
  rewrite_options {
    meta_optimizer_iterations: ONE
  }
}
, '_keep_checkpoint_max': 5, '_keep_checkpoint_every_n_hours': 10000, '_log_step_count_steps': 100, '_train_distribute': None, '_device_fn': None, '_protocol': None, '_eval_distribute': None, '_experimental_distribute': None, '_experimental_max_worker_delay_secs': None, '_session_creation_timeout_secs': 7200, '_service': None, '_cluster_spec': ClusterSpec({}), '_task_type': 'worker', '_task_id': 0, '_global_id_in_cluster': 0, '_master': '', '_evaluation_master': '', '_is_chief': True, '_num_ps_replicas': 0, '_num_worker_replicas': 1}
WARNING:tensorflow:From /tmpfs/src/tf_docs_env/lib/python3.6/site-packages/tensorflow_core/python/training/training_util.py:236: Variable.initialized_value (from tensorflow.python.ops.variables) is deprecated and will be removed in a future version.
Instructions for updating:
Use Variable.read_value. Variables in 2.X are initialized automatically both in eager and graph (inside tf.defun) contexts.
INFO:tensorflow:Calling model_fn.
WARNING:tensorflow:From /tmpfs/src/tf_docs_env/lib/python3.6/site-packages/tensorflow_core/python/feature_column/feature_column_v2.py:518: Layer.add_variable (from tensorflow.python.keras.engine.base_layer) is deprecated and will be removed in a future version.
Instructions for updating:
Please use `layer.add_weight` method instead.
WARNING:tensorflow:From /tmpfs/src/tf_docs_env/lib/python3.6/site-packages/tensorflow_core/python/keras/optimizer_v2/ftrl.py:143: calling Constant.__init__ (from tensorflow.python.ops.init_ops) with dtype is deprecated and will be removed in a future version.
Instructions for updating:
Call initializer instance with the dtype argument instead of passing it to the constructor
INFO:tensorflow:Done calling model_fn.
INFO:tensorflow:Create CheckpointSaverHook.
INFO:tensorflow:Graph was finalized.
INFO:tensorflow:Running local_init_op.
INFO:tensorflow:Done running local_init_op.
INFO:tensorflow:Saving checkpoints for 0 into /tmp/tmpa3lzvfyt/model.ckpt.
INFO:tensorflow:loss = 0.6931472, step = 0
INFO:tensorflow:Saving checkpoints for 50 into /tmp/tmpa3lzvfyt/model.ckpt.
INFO:tensorflow:Loss for final step: 0.42203617.
INFO:tensorflow:Calling model_fn.
INFO:tensorflow:Done calling model_fn.
WARNING:tensorflow:From /tmpfs/src/tf_docs_env/lib/python3.6/site-packages/tensorflow_core/python/saved_model/signature_def_utils_impl.py:145: build_tensor_info (from tensorflow.python.saved_model.utils_impl) is deprecated and will be removed in a future version.
Instructions for updating:
This function will only be available through the v1 compatibility library as tf.compat.v1.saved_model.utils.build_tensor_info or tf.compat.v1.saved_model.build_tensor_info.
INFO:tensorflow:Signatures INCLUDED in export for Classify: ['serving_default', 'classification']
INFO:tensorflow:Signatures INCLUDED in export for Regress: ['regression']
INFO:tensorflow:Signatures INCLUDED in export for Predict: ['predict']
INFO:tensorflow:Signatures INCLUDED in export for Train: None
INFO:tensorflow:Signatures INCLUDED in export for Eval: None
INFO:tensorflow:Restoring parameters from /tmp/tmpa3lzvfyt/model.ckpt-50
INFO:tensorflow:Assets added to graph.
INFO:tensorflow:No assets to write.
INFO:tensorflow:SavedModel written to: /tmp/from_estimator/temp-b'1576897337'/saved_model.pb

This SavedModel accepts serialized tf.Example protocol buffers, which are useful for serving. But we can also load it with tf.saved_model.load and run it from Python.

imported = tf.saved_model.load(export_path)

def predict(x):
  example = tf.train.Example()
  example.features.feature["x"].float_list.value.extend([x])
  return imported.signatures["predict"](
    examples=tf.constant([example.SerializeToString()]))

print(predict(1.5))
print(predict(3.5))

{'all_classes': <tf.Tensor: shape=(1, 2), dtype=string, numpy=array([[b'0', b'1']], dtype=object)>, 'logistic': <tf.Tensor: shape=(1, 1), dtype=float32, numpy=array([[0.5732809]], dtype=float32)>, 'probabilities': <tf.Tensor: shape=(1, 2), dtype=float32, numpy=array([[0.42671916, 0.5732809 ]], dtype=float32)>, 'logits': <tf.Tensor: shape=(1, 1), dtype=float32, numpy=array([[0.2952497]], dtype=float32)>, 'class_ids': <tf.Tensor: shape=(1, 1), dtype=int64, numpy=array([[1]])>, 'classes': <tf.Tensor: shape=(1, 1), dtype=string, numpy=array([[b'1']], dtype=object)>, 'all_class_ids': <tf.Tensor: shape=(1, 2), dtype=int32, numpy=array([[0, 1]], dtype=int32)>}
{'all_classes': <tf.Tensor: shape=(1, 2), dtype=string, numpy=array([[b'0', b'1']], dtype=object)>, 'logistic': <tf.Tensor: shape=(1, 1), dtype=float32, numpy=array([[0.24498816]], dtype=float32)>, 'probabilities': <tf.Tensor: shape=(1, 2), dtype=float32, numpy=array([[0.7550119 , 0.24498813]], dtype=float32)>, 'logits': <tf.Tensor: shape=(1, 1), dtype=float32, numpy=array([[-1.1255237]], dtype=float32)>, 'class_ids': <tf.Tensor: shape=(1, 1), dtype=int64, numpy=array([[0]])>, 'classes': <tf.Tensor: shape=(1, 1), dtype=string, numpy=array([[b'0']], dtype=object)>, 'all_class_ids': <tf.Tensor: shape=(1, 2), dtype=int32, numpy=array([[0, 1]], dtype=int32)>}

tf.estimator.export.build_raw_serving_input_receiver_fn allows you to create input functions which take raw tensors rather than tf.train.Examples.

Load a SavedModel in C++

The C++ version of the SavedModel loader provides an API to load a SavedModel from a path, while allowing SessionOptions and RunOptions. You have to specify the tags associated with the graph to be loaded. The loaded version of SavedModel is referred to as SavedModelBundle and contains the MetaGraphDef and the session within which it is loaded.

const string export_dir = ...
SavedModelBundle bundle;
...
LoadSavedModel(session_options, run_options, export_dir, {kSavedModelTagTrain},
               &bundle);

$ bazel build tensorflow/python/tools:saved_model_cli

A SavedModel contains one or more model variants (technically, v1.MetaGraphDefs), identified by their tag-sets. To serve a model, you might wonder what kind of SignatureDefs are in each model variant, and what are their inputs and outputs. The show command let you examine the contents of the SavedModel in hierarchical order. Here's the syntax:

usage: saved_model_cli show [-h] --dir DIR [--all]
[--tag_set TAG_SET] [--signature_def SIGNATURE_DEF_KEY]

For example, the following command shows all available tag-sets in the SavedModel:

$ saved_model_cli show --dir /tmp/saved_model_dir
The given SavedModel contains the following tag-sets:
serve
serve, gpu

The following command shows all available SignatureDef keys for a tag set:

$ saved_model_cli show --dir /tmp/saved_model_dir --tag_set serve
The given SavedModel `MetaGraphDef` contains `SignatureDefs` with the
following keys:
SignatureDef key: "classify_x2_to_y3"
SignatureDef key: "classify_x_to_y"
SignatureDef key: "regress_x2_to_y3"
SignatureDef key: "regress_x_to_y"
SignatureDef key: "regress_x_to_y2"
SignatureDef key: "serving_default"

If there are multiple tags in the tag-set, you must specify all tags, each tag separated by a comma. For example:

$ saved_model_cli show --dir /tmp/saved_model_dir --tag_set serve,gpu

To show all inputs and outputs TensorInfo for a specific SignatureDef, pass in the SignatureDef key to signature_def option. This is very useful when you want to know the tensor key value, dtype and shape of the input tensors for executing the computation graph later. For example:

$ saved_model_cli show --dir \
/tmp/saved_model_dir --tag_set serve --signature_def serving_default
The given SavedModel SignatureDef contains the following input(s):
  inputs['x'] tensor_info:
      dtype: DT_FLOAT
      shape: (-1, 1)
      name: x:0
The given SavedModel SignatureDef contains the following output(s):
  outputs['y'] tensor_info:
      dtype: DT_FLOAT
      shape: (-1, 1)
      name: y:0
Method name is: tensorflow/serving/predict

To show all available information in the SavedModel, use the --all option. For example:

$ saved_model_cli show --dir /tmp/saved_model_dir --all
MetaGraphDef with tag-set: 'serve' contains the following SignatureDefs:

signature_def['classify_x2_to_y3']:
  The given SavedModel SignatureDef contains the following input(s):
    inputs['inputs'] tensor_info:
        dtype: DT_FLOAT
        shape: (-1, 1)
        name: x2:0
  The given SavedModel SignatureDef contains the following output(s):
    outputs['scores'] tensor_info:
        dtype: DT_FLOAT
        shape: (-1, 1)
        name: y3:0
  Method name is: tensorflow/serving/classify

...

signature_def['serving_default']:
  The given SavedModel SignatureDef contains the following input(s):
    inputs['x'] tensor_info:
        dtype: DT_FLOAT
        shape: (-1, 1)
        name: x:0
  The given SavedModel SignatureDef contains the following output(s):
    outputs['y'] tensor_info:
        dtype: DT_FLOAT
        shape: (-1, 1)
        name: y:0
  Method name is: tensorflow/serving/predict

run command

Invoke the run command to run a graph computation, passing inputs and then displaying (and optionally saving) the outputs. Here's the syntax:

usage: saved_model_cli run [-h] --dir DIR --tag_set TAG_SET --signature_def
                           SIGNATURE_DEF_KEY [--inputs INPUTS]
                           [--input_exprs INPUT_EXPRS]
                           [--input_examples INPUT_EXAMPLES] [--outdir OUTDIR]
                           [--overwrite] [--tf_debug]

The run command provides the following three ways to pass inputs to the model:

• --inputs option enables you to pass numpy ndarray in files.
• --input_exprs option enables you to pass Python expressions.
• --input_examples option enables you to pass tf.train.Example.

--inputs

To pass input data in files, specify the --inputs option, which takes the following general format:

--inputs <INPUTS>

where INPUTS is either of the following formats:

• <input_key>=<filename>
• <input_key>=<filename>[<variable_name>]

You may pass multiple INPUTS. If you do pass multiple inputs, use a semicolon to separate each of the INPUTS.

saved_model_cli uses numpy.load to load the filename. The filename may be in any of the following formats:

• .npy
• .npz
• pickle format

A .npy file always contains a numpy ndarray. Therefore, when loading from a .npy file, the content will be directly assigned to the specified input tensor. If you specify a variable_name with that .npy file, the variable_name will be ignored and a warning will be issued.

When loading from a .npz (zip) file, you may optionally specify a variable_name to identify the variable within the zip file to load for the input tensor key. If you don't specify a variable_name, the SavedModel CLI will check that only one file is included in the zip file and load it for the specified input tensor key.

When loading from a pickle file, if no variable_name is specified in the square brackets, whatever that is inside the pickle file will be passed to the specified input tensor key. Otherwise, the SavedModel CLI will assume a dictionary is stored in the pickle file and the value corresponding to the variable_name will be used.

--input_exprs

To pass inputs through Python expressions, specify the --input_exprs option. This can be useful for when you don't have data files lying around, but still want to sanity check the model with some simple inputs that match the dtype and shape of the model's SignatureDefs. For example:

`<input_key>=[[1],[2],[3]]`

In addition to Python expressions, you may also pass numpy functions. For example:

`<input_key>=np.ones((32,32,3))`

(Note that the numpy module is already available to you as np.)

--input_examples

To pass tf.train.Example as inputs, specify the --input_examples option. For each input key, it takes a list of dictionary, where each dictionary is an instance of tf.train.Example. The dictionary keys are the features and the values are the value lists for each feature. For example:

`<input_key>=[{"age":[22,24],"education":["BS","MS"]}]`

Save output

By default, the SavedModel CLI writes output to stdout. If a directory is passed to --outdir option, the outputs will be saved as .npy files named after output tensor keys under the given directory.

Use --overwrite to overwrite existing output files.