Path: blob/master/cloud/notebooks/python_sdk/deployments/python_function/Use function to recognize hand-written digits.ipynb
6408 views
Use Python function to recognize hand-written digits with ibm-watsonx-ai
Create and deploy a function that receives HTML canvas image data from a web app and then processes and sends that data to a model trained to recognize handwritten digits. See: MNIST function deployment tutorial
This notebook runs on Python 3.11.
Learning goals
The learning goals of this notebook are:
AI function definition
Store AI function
Deployment creation
Contents
This notebook contains the following parts:
1. Set up the environment
Before you use the sample code in this notebook, you must perform the following setup tasks:
Create a watsonx.ai Runtime Service instance (a free plan is offered and information about how to create the instance can be found here).
Install and import the ibm-watsonx-ai
and dependecies
Note: ibm-watsonx-ai
documentation can be found here.
Connection to watsonx.ai Runtime
Authenticate the watsonx.ai Runtime service on IBM Cloud. You need to provide platform api_key
and instance location
.
You can use IBM Cloud CLI to retrieve platform API Key and instance location.
API Key can be generated in the following way:
In result, get the value of api_key
from the output.
Location of your watsonx.ai Runtime instance can be retrieved in the following way:
In result, get the value of location
from the output.
Tip: Your Cloud API key
can be generated by going to the Users section of the Cloud console. From that page, click your name, scroll down to the API Keys section, and click Create an IBM Cloud API key. Give your key a name and click Create, then copy the created key and paste it below. You can also get a service specific url by going to the Endpoint URLs section of the watsonx.ai Runtime docs. You can check your instance location in your watsonx.ai Runtime Service instance details.
You can also get service specific apikey by going to the Service IDs section of the Cloud Console. From that page, click Create, then copy the created key and paste it below.
Action: Enter your api_key
and location
in the following cell.
Working with spaces
First of all, you need to create a space that will be used for your work. If you do not have space already created, you can use Deployment Spaces Dashboard to create one.
Click New Deployment Space
Create an empty space
Select Cloud Object Storage
Select watsonx.ai Runtime instance and press Create
Copy
space_id
and paste it below
Tip: You can also use SDK to prepare the space for your work. More information can be found here.
Action: Assign space ID below
You can use list
method to print all existing spaces.
To be able to interact with all resources available in watsonx.ai Runtime, you need to set space which you will be using.
2. Get an ID for a model deployment
The deployed function created in this notebook is designed to send payload data to a TensorFlow model created in the MNIST tutorials.
Option 1: Use your own, existing model deployment
If you already deployed a model while working through one of the following MNIST tutorials, you can use that model deployment:
Paste the model deployment ID in the following cell.
Option 2: Download, store, and deploy a sample model
You can deployed a sample model and get its deployment ID by running the code in the following four cells.
3.1 Download sample data file
3.2 View sample data
4. Create a deployable function
The basics of creating and deploying functions in watsonx.ai Runtime.
4.1 Define the function
Define a Python closure with an inner function named "score".
Use default parameters to save your watsonx.ai Runtime credentials and the model deployment ID with the deployed function.
Process the canvas data (reshape and normalize) and then send the processed data to the model deployment.
Process the results from the model deployment so the deployed function returns simpler results.
Implement error handling so the function will behave gracefully if there is an error.
4.2 Test locally
You can test your function in the notebook before deploying the function.
To see debugging info:
Uncomment the print statements inside the score function
Rerun the cell defining the function
When you rerun the this cell, you will see the debugging info
5. Store and deploy the function
Before you can deploy the function, you must store the function in your watsonx.ai Runtime repository.
6. Test the deployed function
You can use the watsonx.ai Python client or REST API to send data to your function deployment for processing in exactly the same way you send data to model deployments for processing.
6.1 watsonx.ai Python client
6.2 watsonx.ai REST API example
If you want to clean up all created assets:
experiments
trainings
pipelines
model definitions
models
functions
deployments
please follow up this sample notebook.
Authors
Sarah Packowski is a member of the IBM Watson Studio Content Design team in Canada.
Mateusz Szewczyk, Software Engineer at watsonx.ai
Copyright © 2020-2025 IBM. This notebook and its source code are released under the terms of the MIT License.