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reactivePoll()s watched only
each run’s own status.json mtime, which misses a change
when the file that actually matters (the adapter, or a run’s directory
being renamed by archive/restore) is written or moved without
status.json itself changing again. All of the app’s
run-list pollers now share runs_change_signature(), which
changes whenever any file anywhere under the runs directory is added,
edited, or moved.ImportError on cloud GPUs
(pinning torchao>=0.16.0 in requirements) turned out not
to be reliably honored on Colab’s and Kaggle’s preinstalled environment
(pip reported success but the old 0.10.0 build was still what got
imported). The requirements pin is reverted, and the shared remote
notebook (inst/remote/dragonfarm_remote.ipynb, used by
dragon_remote() for Colab, Kaggle, Lightning AI, and
RunPod) now explicitly uninstalls torchao after installing the trainer’s
requirements. dragonfarm never imports torchao itself, and peft’s LoRA
dispatch skips its torchao check cleanly when the package is entirely
absent rather than present at an old version, so removing it sidesteps
the problem instead of depending on pip to upgrade it in place.dragon_remote() on Colab, Kaggle,
Lightning AI, and RunPod) failing with
ImportError: Found an incompatible version of torchao.
dragonfarm never uses torchao, but recent peft versions
probe it while dispatching LoRA and raise instead of skipping when an
older version is already installed, which Colab and Kaggle’s base images
ship by default. dragon_python_requirements() now pins
torchao>=0.16.0 so the bundled
requirements.txt installs a compatible version.CRAN maintainers reviewed 0.1.1 and asked for several changes, folded into this release along with everything added since 0.2.0:
dragon_runs_dir() used to default to
dragonfarm_runs under the working directory; a package must
not write there without being asked. It now defaults to
dragonfarm_runs under a session temp directory, so a fresh
R session never writes to your project or home folder on its own, and
that folder disappears when the session ends. For runs you want to keep,
set
options(dragonfarm.runs_dir = "path/to/dragonfarm_runs") or
the DRAGONFARM_RUNS_DIR environment variable once, or pass
runs_dir= to the function you’re calling. See
?dragon_runs_dir and the README.dragon_judge(),
dragon_split(),
dragon_synthesize()/dragon_prompts()) that
saved and restored .Random.seed by hand for a seeded
sample; they now use withr::with_seed(), which does the
same thing without dragonfarm’s own code touching
.GlobalEnv. withr moved from Suggests to
Imports. dragon_resume()’s log line now goes through a
small file-append helper rather than cat().if (interactive()) instead of \dontrun{}, so
R CMD check at least parses them; they still don’t run
during checks or on CRAN’s servers.Title and
Description fields are now quoted and cased correctly
('Python', 'shiny'), and quotes were removed
from LoRA, which is a technique name, not a package.testthat-based tests for the three app modules
(Data, Model, Try it) that had none, covering their server logic without
needing a real Shiny session, Python, or a GPU.dragon_reward("command", command = ...): a reward
for dragon_reinforce() that runs a command (a test suite, a
linter) against the completion and scores by its exit code or a number
in its stdout. Runs the command directly, never through a shell, so the
completion’s own text cannot inject anything into the command
line.
The Chat tab streams replies token by token, for the local worker and for server backends alike, instead of showing the whole reply only once generation finishes. Compare mode still shows each side’s full reply once it lands.
Starting a training run now stops the local inference worker first, if one is loaded from an earlier Try it or Chat call. Two heavy Python/CUDA processes starting at the same moment has occasionally crashed a fresh trainer on Windows; freeing the worker’s GPU memory first is the most likely trigger and costs nothing, since the worker restarts automatically on the next generation call.
The Python side (inst/python) is now also its own
installable package: pip install ./inst/python (or a built
wheel) gives a dragonfarm command (check,
train, generate, pack) and a
dragonfarm.api module (Run,
runs()) for reading a run directory from plain Python, with
no R involved. A run started from R can be inspected or continued from
Python and back, since both read and write the same files. Not yet
published to PyPI.
Runs can be archived, restored, and deleted.
dragon_archive_run() moves a run’s directory under
archived/ (every file kept; it just drops out of
dragon_runs() and the app);
dragon_unarchive_run() brings it back;
dragon_delete_run() removes it for good. Both refuse a run
that is queued or running, or one that another run continues from,
unless force = TRUE. The Monitor panel gets Archive and
Delete buttons (Delete asks for confirmation first), a “Show archived”
toggle, and Restore.
Chat gets context limits, a second backend to compare with, and
transcript round-tripping in the app.
dragon_chat(context_window=) tracks an approximate token
budget and automatically drops the oldest turns to stay under it;
$context_usage() reports tokens used, the window, and how
many turns were dropped. The Chat tab shows a warning banner near the
limit, a “Compare with a second backend” toggle sends the same message
to a second backend or run side by side (feedback stays scoped to the
primary conversation), and Load transcript / Export as training example
round out Save transcript.
Fixed a bug in the Chat tab (introduced while building the above)
where Shiny’s default “suspend when hidden” behaviour left the
conversation panes permanently blank the first time the tab was opened,
because they sit behind a renderUI() rather than being part
of the tab’s static markup; the affected outputs now opt out of that
suspension.
dragon_synthesize() gets a quality pass and a judge
filter. It now drops replies that are too short or too long, look
garbled or wrong-script, repeat an earlier prompt, or repeat (or nearly
repeat) an earlier response, before writing the dataset. Passing a
judge scores every surviving reply and keeps only the ones
at or above min_score, for teacher distillation with a
quality gate – pass a run’s own prompts
(dragon_prompts(run, "train")) to distill and filter in one
call.
The app no longer freezes on long actions. Evaluate, Run judge, Build preference pairs, and Merge run as one-step background pipelines; the panel shows progress, the result appears when it lands, and the Pipeline panel lists them.
dragon_pipeline_cancel() and a Cancel button on
running pipelines. A training step in flight stops after saving a
checkpoint; other steps finish first. Records now carry the runner’s
pid, so a pipeline whose process died reads as failed instead of running
forever.
dragon_step_merge(): a pipeline step that writes the
latest run as a standalone model.
dragon_publish(): push a run’s merged model or
adapter to a repo on the Hugging Face Hub, creating it if needed.
dragon_step_publish() for pipelines, and a Publish card in
the app’s Try it panel.
Human feedback becomes data. In dragon_chat() and
the app’s Chat panel, replies can be rated up or down, edited, or
regenerated; every verdict is saved under feedback/.
dragon_feedback() turns them into a conversations dataset
of liked and edited replies and a preference-pairs dataset where the
same prompt drew a liked and a disliked reply.
dragon_conversations(): whole multi-turn
conversations as training data, from a list, a JSONL file, or a data
frame. They train wherever prompt and response rows do.
Two new vignettes: the post-training loop, and reinforcement learning with verifiable rewards.
Inference backends. dragon_generate() and everything
built on it now route through a backend:
dragon_backend_local() is a Python worker that keeps the
last two models loaded, so repeated calls no longer reload the model;
dragon_backend_server() talks to any OpenAI-compatible chat
endpoint (vLLM, llama.cpp, LM Studio, hosted services), and
dragon_backend_ollama() to Ollama.
dragon_serve_ollama() merges a run and registers it with
Ollama in one call. dragon_worker_stop() frees the worker’s
memory. Set a session default with
options(dragonfarm.backend).
dragon_chat(): a conversation object with memory,
streaming through on_token where the backend supports it,
save and load of transcripts, and export of a conversation as a training
example. The app gains a Chat panel with a backend selector and a system
prompt.
Pipelines. dragon_pipeline() chains stages built
from dragon_step_*() constructors (train, synthesize pairs,
prefer, reinforce, judge, evaluate), threading each stage’s run into the
next and writing a record after every step.
background = TRUE runs it in a separate R process;
dragon_pipeline_status() follows it.
dragon_compare() accepts a pipeline. The app gains a
Pipeline panel that launches the standard recipe and shows every run’s
lineage.
Reinforcement learning. dragon_map_prompts() maps
prompts with an optional reference answer, dragon_reward()
defines verifiable rewards (exact, contains, numeric, regex, JSON,
length, keyword, or a custom Python function), and
dragon_reinforce() runs GRPO: the model samples a group of
answers per prompt, the rewards score them, and it learns from the ones
that beat their group’s average, with a KL penalty towards the model it
started from. Implemented in the package’s own trainer, so no new
dependency. Evaluation reports mean held-out reward per reward; the
app’s Map and Train panels gain an RL mode with a reward
builder.
Synthetic data closes the loop. dragon_synthesize()
has a teacher model answer your prompts to make fine-tuning data;
dragon_synthesize_pairs() samples a run’s own replies, has
a judge score them, and keeps the best and worst as preference pairs (or
pairs a teacher’s reply against the student’s).
dragon_prompts() pulls prompts from a run’s data files.
dragon_llm_anthropic() and dragon_llm_ellmer()
turn the Claude API or any ellmer chat into a teacher; the judge
variants are now wrappers over them. The app’s Try it panel gains an
Improve card that builds pairs from the selected run and loads them for
the next stage.
Evaluation that can drive decisions.
dragon_evaluate() gains metrics: deterministic
task checks (exact match, token F1, JSON validity, numeric answers,
length, custom functions) over every held-out row.
dragon_judge() scores a run’s replies with a language model
or compares them pairwise with the model it started from, with position
swapping so a biased judge produces ties rather than wins;
dragon_judge_anthropic() talks to the Claude API directly
and dragon_judge_ellmer() wraps any ellmer chat, and any
local model can judge too. dragon_compare() puts every
run’s measurements side by side. The app gains task metrics and a
comparison table in Monitor and a Judge card in Try it.
Post-training stages. dragon_map_pairs() maps
prompt, chosen, and rejected columns, and dragon_prefer()
runs preference optimization on them with DPO or ORPO. Any function that
takes a model also accepts a finished run: its adapters are
folded into the weights before the new stage adds its own, so fine-tune
then prefer chains naturally, locally or through the cloud bundle. Runs
record their stage, dragon_evaluate() reports
preference accuracy and reward margin, and the app’s Map and Train
panels gain a preference-pairs mode and a “Start from” run
picker.
Driver download link updated to NVIDIA’s canonical URL, which CRAN’s URL check had flagged as a redirect.
dragon_check() now explains a CPU-only result on a
machine with an NVIDIA GPU: no driver, a driver too old for the
installed torch, or a CPU-only torch build, each with the one-line
fix.dragon_bundle(), dragon_remote(), and
dragon_import() take a run to a cloud GPU (Google Colab,
Kaggle, Lightning AI, or RunPod) and bring the trained adapter back, for
machines without a GPU. dragon_remote_providers() lists the
providers. The app gains the same path in its Train and Monitor panels,
and dragon_check() points to it when it finds no GPU.First release.
dragon_dataset(), dragon_map(), and
dragon_split() turn a table into chat-format training data
with glue templates for combining columns.dragon_train() runs LoRA fine-tuning of any Hugging
Face causal language model in a background Python process. Runs live on
disk and survive the R session; dragon_run() reopens
them.dragon_status(), dragon_progress(),
dragon_logs(), dragon_wait(),
dragon_cancel(), and dragon_resume() manage a
run.dragon_evaluate(), dragon_generate(), and
dragon_merge() cover held-out evaluation, generation from
the adapter or the base model, and merging into a standalone model.
dragon_export_gguf() wraps the llama.cpp converter when one
is available.dragon_app() launches a Shiny app with drag-and-drop
dataset upload, drag-and-drop column mapping, a live loss curve, and a
before-and-after comparison panel. dragon_code() returns
the R script for any run.reticulate::py_require() and built automatically. On
Windows with an NVIDIA GPU the CUDA build of torch is selected on first
use.These binaries (installable software) and packages are in development.
They may not be fully stable and should be used with caution. We make no claims about them.