xgboost/doc/external_memory.md
2015-04-19 00:55:11 -07:00

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Using XGBoost External Memory Version
====
There is no big difference between using external memory version and in-memory version.
The only difference is the filename format.
The external memory version takes in the following filename format
```
filename#cacheprefix
```
The ```filename``` is the normal path to libsvm file you want to load in, ```cacheprefix``` is a
path to a cache file that xgboost will use for external memory cache.
The following code was extracted from [../demo/guide-python/external_memory.py](../demo/guide-python/external_memory.py)
```python
dtrain = xgb.DMatrix('../data/agaricus.txt.train#dtrain.cache')
```
You can find that there is additional ```#dtrain.cache``` following the libsvm file, this is the name of cache file.
For CLI version, simply use ```"../data/agaricus.txt.train#dtrain.cache"``` in filename.
Performance Note
====
* the parameter ```nthread``` should be set to number of ***real*** cores
- Most modern CPU offer hyperthreading, which means you can have a 4 core cpu with 8 threads
- Set nthread to be 4 for maximum performance in such case
Usage Note:
====
* This is a experimental version
- If you like to try and test it, report results to https://github.com/dmlc/xgboost/issues/244
* Currently only importing from libsvm format is supported
- Contribution of ingestion from other common external memory data source is welcomed