if __name__ == "__main__":
means current file is executed under a shell instead of imported as a module.
tf.app.run()
As you can see through the file app.py
def run(main=None, argv=None):
"""Runs the program with an optional 'main' function and 'argv' list."""
f = flags.FLAGS
# Extract the args from the optional `argv` list.
args = argv[1:] if argv else None
# Parse the known flags from that list, or from the command
# line otherwise.
# pylint: disable=protected-access
flags_passthrough = f._parse_flags(args=args)
# pylint: enable=protected-access
main = main or sys.modules['__main__'].main
# Call the main function, passing through any arguments
# to the final program.
sys.exit(main(sys.argv[:1] + flags_passthrough))
Let's break line by line:
flags_passthrough = f._parse_flags(args=args)
This ensures that the argument you parse through command line is valid,e.g. python my_model.py --data_dir='...' --max_iteration=10000
Acturally, this feature is implemented based on python standardargparse
model.
main = main or sys.modules['__main__'].main
The first main
in right side of =
is the first argument of current functionrun(main=None, argv=None)
. While sys.modules['__main__']
means current running file(e.g.my_model.py
).
So there are two cases:
-
You don't have a
main
function inmy_model.py
Then you have tocalltf.app.run(my_main_running_function)
-
you have a
main
function inmy_model.py
. (This is most the case.)
Last line:
sys.exit(main(sys.argv[:1] + flags_passthrough))
ensures your main(argv)
or my_main_running_function(argv)
function is called with parsed arguments properly.
A missing piece of the puzzle for beginner Tensorflow users: Tensorflow has some builtin command line flag handling mechanism. You can define your flags like tf.flags.DEFINE_integer('batch_size', 128, 'Number of images to process in a batch.')
and then if you use tf.app.run()
it will set things up so that you can globally access the passed values of the flags you defined, like tf.flags.FLAGS.batch_size
from wherever you need it in your code