Welcome to Hands-On Neural Network Development Using C#. I want to thank you for purchasing this book and for taking this journey with us. It seems as if, everywhere you turn, everywhere you go, all you hear and read about is machine learning, artificial intelligence, deep learning, neuron this, artificial that, and on and on. And, to add to all that excitement, everyone you talk to has a slightly different idea about the meaning of each of those terms.
In this chapter, we are going to go over some very basic neural network terminology to set the stage for future chapters. We need to be speaking the same language, just to make sure that everything we do in later chapters is crystal clear.
I should also let you know that the goal of the book is to get you, a C# developer, up and running as fast as possible. To do this, we will use as many open source libraries as possible. We must do a few custom applications, but we've provided the source code for these as well. In all cases, we want you to be able to add this functionality to your applications with maximal speed and minimal effort.
OK, let's begin.
Neural networks have been around for very many years but have made a resurgence over the past few years and are now a hot topic. And that, my friends, is why this book is being written. The goal here is to help you get through the weeds and into the open so you can navigate your neural path to success. There is a specific focus in this book on C# .NET developers. I wanted to make sure that the C# developers out there had handy resources that could be of some help in their projects, rather than the Python, R, and MATLAB code we more commonly see. If you have Visual Studio installed and a strong desire to learn, you are ready to begin your journey.
First, let's make sure we're clear on a couple of things. In writing this book, the assumption was made that you, the reader, had limited exposure to neural networks. If you do have some exposure, that is great; you may feel free to jump to the sections that interest you the most. I also assumed that you are an experienced C# developer, and have built applications using C#, .NET, and Visual Studio, although I made no assumptions as to which versions of each you may have used. The goal is not about C# syntax, the .NET framework, or Visual Studio itself. Once again, the purpose is to get as many valuable resources into the hands of developers, so they can embellish their code and create world-class applications.
Now that we've gotten that out of the way, I know you're excited to jump right in and start coding, but to make you productive, we first must spend some time going over some basics. A little bit of theory, some fascinating insights into the whys and wherefores, and we're going to throw in a few visuals along the way to help with the rough-and-tough dry stuff. Don't worry; we won't go too deep on the theory, and, in a few pages from here, you'll be writing and going through source code!
Also, keep in mind that research in this area is rapidly evolving. What is the latest and greatest today is old news next month. Therefore, consider this book an overview of different research and opinions. It is not the be-all-and-end-all bible of everything neural network-related, nor should it be perceived to be. You are very likely to encounter someone else with different opinions from that of the writer. You're going to find people who will write apps and functions differently. That's great—gather all the information that you can, and make informed choices on your own. Only doing by that will you increase your knowledge base.
This chapter will include the following topics:
- Neural network overview
- The role of neural networks in today's enterprises
- Types of learning
- Understanding perceptions
- Understanding activation functions
- Understanding back propagation
