Getting Started

Here you will learn how to get a Gradient notebook running alongside the fast.ai framework.

Creating an account

Firstly, you will have to create an account with Gradient

Creating a Notebook

Now that we have signed into our account, we can create a fast.ai notebook:

  • In the Notebooks tab, click "Create Notebook"
  • Create a name for your Notebook
  • Select "Paperspace + fast.ai"
  • Choose any available instance for your machine type. (A GPU instance is preferable, but we can change this later).
  • After you confirm and create the notebook you will see your new notebook:
  • However you may see "Error" in the status column if you are using a free machine instance.
  • This error is caused because some free machine types may not be available.
    FIX: you need to click the start button under the “Actions” column
  • Change the instance type to one of the free GPU’s. It may take a few attempts to find one that will work. You will know that a particular instance will work when the "Start Notebook" button will become selectable.

  • Click “Start Notebook”
  • If the instance type is available you will see the notebook starting up:
  • It may take a few minutes to start running, you will know when it's done:

Opening a fast.ai chapter's Notebook

  • Under "Actions" click one of "Open" options. (I prefer V1 and will be using it in this tutorial):
  • You should see a collection of folders and notebook(.ipynb) files here.
    (If you don't, and only see "Data" and "Storage" try making a new notebook following the same processes outlined previously and that should fix it.)
  • However, before we open one of the chapter's Notebooks we should update our fast.ai container.
  • Open a terminal console by clicking the "New" button and then selecting "Terminal".
  • Once your terminal is open type the following command and hit enter:
    pip install fastai fastcore --upgrade
  • After it's finished it will look like this:
  • You can now close the terminal window.
  • Open whichever chapter's Notebook you wish:
  • In order to run the cells, just simply select the cell and click the "Run" button in the toolbar near the top.
    • Have fun learning Fast.ai!