Skill Enhancement Course (SEC)

Artificial Intelligence
Course – 1: Azure AI Fundamentals

AI-900 pathway consists of 5 courses and 2 reading material:

i. Introduction to AI on Azure

ii. Use visual tools to create machine learning models with Azure Machine
Learning

iii. Explore computer vision in Microsoft Azure iv. Explore natural language
processing

v. Explore conversational AI

vi. Tune Model Hyperparameters - Azure Machine Learning (Reading) vii.

Neural Network Regression: Module Reference – Azure Machine Learning
(Reading).

Path 1: Introduction to AI on Azure

With AI, we can build solutions that seemed like science fiction a
short time ago; enabling incredible advances in health care, financial
management, environmental protection, and other areas to make a
better world for everyone.

Learning objectives

In this module, you’ll learn about the kinds of solution AI can make
possible and considerations for responsible AI practices.
Introduction to AI
AI enables us to build amazing software that can improve health care, enable people to
overcome physical disadvantages, empower smart infrastructure, create incredible
entertainment experiences, and even save the planet!

What is AI?
Simply put, AI is the creation of software that imitates human behaviors and
capabilities. Key workloads include:

• Machine learning - This is often the foundation for an AI system, and is the
way we "teach" a computer model to make prediction and draw conclusions
from data.
• Anomaly detection - The capability to automatically detect errors or unusual
activity in a system.
• Computer vision - The capability of software to interpret the world visually
through cameras, video, and images.
• Natural language processing - The capability for a computer to interpret
written or spoken language, and respond in kind.
• Knowledge mining - The capability to extract information from large volumes
of often unstructured data to create a searchable knowledge store.
Understand machine learning

Machine Learning is the foundation for most AI solutions.

Let’s start by looking at a real-world example of how machine learning can be used
to solve a difficult problem.
Sustainable farming techniques are essential to maximize food production while
protecting a fragile environment. The Yield, an agricultural technology company
based in Australia, uses sensors, data and machine learning to help farmers make
informed decisions related to weather, soil and plant conditions.

How machine learning works

So how do machines learn?
The answer is, from data. In today’s world, we create huge volumes of data as we go
about our everyday lives. From the text messages, emails, and social media posts we
send to the photographs and videos we take on our phones, we generate massive
amounts of information. More data still is created by millions of sensors in our
homes, cars, cities, public transport infrastructure, and factories.

Data scientists can use all of that data to train machine learning models that can
make predictions and inferences based on the relationships they find in the data.

For example, suppose an environmental conservation organization wants volunteers

to identify and catalog different species of wildflower using a phone app. The
following animation shows how machine learning can be used to enable this
scenario.
 1. A team of botanists and scientists collect data on wildflower samples.
2. The team labels the samples with the correct species.
3. The labeled data is processed using an algorithm that finds relationships
between the features of the samples and the labeled species.
4. The results of the algorithm are encapsulated in a model.
5. When new samples are found by volunteers, the model can identify the correct
species label.

Machine learning in Microsoft Azure

Microsoft Azure provides the Azure Machine Learning service - a cloud-based
platform for creating, managing, and publishing machine learning models. Azure
Machine Learning provides the following features and capabilities:
Feature Capability
Automated machine This feature enables non-experts to quickly create an effective machine
learning learning model from data.

Azure Machine A graphical interface enabling no-code development of machine learning

Learning designer solutions.

Data and compute Cloud-based data storage and compute resources that professional data
management scientists can use to run data experiment code at scale.

Pipelines Data scientists, software engineers, and IT operations professionals can

define pipelines to orchestrate model training, deployment, and
management tasks.

Understand anomaly detection

Imagine you’re creating a software system to monitor credit card transactions and
detect unusual usage patterns that might indicate fraud. Or an application that tracks
activity in an automated production line and identifies failures. Or a racing car
telemetry system that uses sensors to proactively warn engineers about potential
mechanical failures before they happen.

These kinds of scenario can be addressed by using anomaly detection - a machine

learning based technique that analyzes data over time and identifies unusual
changes.

Let’s explore how anomaly detection might help in the racing car scenario.

1. Sensors in the car collect telemetry, such as engine revolutions, brake

temperature, and so on.
 2. An anomaly detection model is trained to understand expected fluctuations in
the telemetry measurements over time.
3. If a measurement occurs outside of the normal expected range, the model
reports an anomaly that can be used to alert the race engineer to call the driver
in for a pit stop to fix the issue before it forces retirement from the race.

Anomaly detection in Microsoft Azure

In Microsoft Azure, the Anomaly Detector service provides an application
programming interface (API) that developers can use to create anomaly detection
solutions.

Understand computer vision

Computer Vision is an area of AI that deals with visual processing. Let’s explore some
of the possibilities that computer vision brings.

The Seeing AI app is a great example of the power of computer vision. Designed for
the blind and low vision community, the Seeing AI app harnesses the power of AI to
open up the visual world and describe nearby people, text and objects.

View the following video to learn more about Seeing AI.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/videoplayer/embed/RE4vC2Q?postJsllMsg=true

Computer Vision models and capabilities

Most computer vision solutions are based on machine learning models that can be
applied to visual input from cameras, videos, or images. The following table describes
common computer vision tasks.
Image
classification

Image classification involves training a machine learning model to classify

images based on their contents. For example, in a traffic monitoring
solution you might use an image classification model to classify images
based on the type of vehicle they contain, such as taxis, buses, cyclists,
and so on.

Object
detection

Object detection machine learning models are trained to classify

individual objects within an image, and identify their location with a
bounding box. For example, a traffic monitoring solution might use
object detection to identify the location of different classes of vehicle.
Semantic segmentation
 Semantic segmentation is an advanced machine learning technique in
which individual pixels in the image are classified according to the
object to which they belong. For example, a traffic monitoring solution
might overlay traffic images with "mask" layers to highlight different
vehicles using specific colors.

Image
analysis

You can create solutions that combine machine learning models with
advanced image analysis techniques to extract information from
images, including "tags" that could help catalog the image or even
descriptive captions that summarize the scene shown in the image.
Face detection, analysis, and recognition
 Face detection is a specialized form of object detection that locates
human faces in an image. This can be combined with classification and
facial geometry analysis techniques to recognize individuals based on
their facial features.

Optical character recognition

(OCR)
 Optical character recognition is a technique used to detect and read
text in images. You can use OCR to read text in photographs (for
example, road signs or store fronts) or to extract information from
scanned documents such as letters, invoices, or forms.

Computer vision services in Microsoft Azure

Microsoft Azure provides the following cognitive services to help you create
computer vision solutions:
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Service Capabilities

Computer You can use this service to analyze images and video, and extract descriptions, tags,
Vision objects, and text.

Custom Vision Use this service to train custom image classification and object detection models
using your own images.

Face The Face service enables you to build face detection and facial recognition solutions.

Form Use this service to extract information from scanned forms and invoices. Recognizer

Understand natural language processing

Completed100 XP

• 3 minutes

Natural language processing (NLP) is the area of AI that deals with creating software
that understands written and spoken language.

NLP enables you to create software that can:

• Analyze and interpret text in documents, email messages, and other sources.
• Interpret spoken language, and synthesize speech responses.
• Automatically translate spoken or written phrases between languages.
• Interpret commands and determine appropriate actions.

For example, Starship Commander, is a virtual reality (VR) game from Human Interact,
that takes place in a science fiction world. The game uses natural language
processing to enable players to control the narrative and interact with in-game
characters and starship systems. Watch the following video to learn more.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/videoplayer/embed/RE4vyDj?postJsllMsg=true
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Natural language processing in Microsoft Azure

In Microsoft Azure, you can use the following cognitive services to build natural
language processing solutions:

Service Capabilities

Language Use this service to access features for understanding and analyzing text,
training language models that can understand spoken or text-based
commands, and building intelligent applications.

Translator Use this service to translate text between more than 60 languages.

Speech Use this service to recognize and synthesize speech, and to translate spoken
languages.

Azure Bot This service provides a platform for conversational AI, the capability of a
software "agent" to participate in a conversation. Developers can use the
Bot Framework to create a bot and manage it with Azure Bot Service -
integrating back-end services like Language, and connecting to channels for
web chat, email, Microsoft Teams, and others.

Understand knowledge mining

Knowledge mining is the term used to describe solutions that involve extracting
information from large volumes of often unstructured data to create a searchable
knowledge store.

Knowledge mining in Microsoft Azure

One of these knowledge mining solutions is Azure Cognitive Search, a private,
enterprise, search solution that has tools for building indexes. The indexes can then be
used for internal only use, or to enable searchable content on public facing internet
assets.

Azure Cognitive Search can utilize the built-in AI capabilities of Azure Cognitive
Services such as image processing, content extraction, and natural language
processing to perform knowledge mining of documents. The product’s AI capabilities
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makes it possible to index previously unsearchable documents and to extract and

surface insights from large amounts of data quickly.
Challenges and risks with AI
Artificial Intelligence is a powerful tool that can be used to greatly benefit the world.
However, like any tool, it must be used responsibly.

The following table shows some of the potential challenges and risks facing an AI
application developer.

Challenge or Risk Example

Bias can affect results A loan-approval model discriminates by gender due to bias in the
data with which it was trained

Errors may cause harm An autonomous vehicle experiences a system failure and causes a
collision

Data could be exposed A medical diagnostic bot is trained using sensitive patient data,
which is stored insecurely

Solutions may not A home automation assistant provides no audio output for
work for everyone visually impaired users

Users must trust a An AI-based financial tool makes investment recommendations -

complex system what are they based on?

Who’s liable for AI- An innocent person is convicted of a crime based on evidence
driven decisions? from facial recognition – who’s responsible?

Understand Responsible AI
At Microsoft, AI software development is guided by a set of six principles, designed
to ensure that AI applications provide amazing solutions to difficult problems
without any unintended negative consequences.

Fairness
AI systems should treat all people fairly. For example, suppose you create a machine
learning model to support a loan approval application for a bank. The model should
predict whether the loan should be approved or denied without bias. This bias could
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be based on gender, ethnicity, or other factors that result in an unfair advantage or

disadvantage to specific groups of applicants.
Azure Machine Learning includes the capability to interpret models and quantify the
extent to which each feature of the data influences the model’s prediction. This
capability helps data scientists and developers identify and mitigate bias in the
model.

Another example is Microsoft’s implementation of Responsible AI with the Face

service, which retires facial recognition capabilities that can be used to try to infer
emotional states and identity attributes. These capabilities, if misused, can subject
people to stereotyping, discrimination or unfair denial of services.

For more details about considerations for fairness, watch the following video.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/videoplayer/embed/RE4vqfa?postJsllMsg=true

Reliability and safety

AI systems should perform reliably and safely. For example, consider an AI-based
software system for an autonomous vehicle; or a machine learning model that
diagnoses patient symptoms and recommends prescriptions. Unreliability in these
kinds of systems can result in substantial risk to human life.

AI-based software application development must be subjected to rigorous testing

and deployment management processes to ensure that they work as expected before
release.

For more information about considerations for reliability and safety, watch the

following video. https://www.microsoft.com/en-

us/videoplayer/embed/RE4vvIl?postJsllMsg=true

Privacy and security

AI systems should be secure and respect privacy. The machine learning models on
which AI systems are based rely on large volumes of data, which may contain
personal details that must be kept private. Even after the models are trained and the
system is in production, privacy and security need to be considered. As the system
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uses new data to make predictions or take action, both the data and decisions made
from the data may be subject to privacy or security concerns.

For more details about considerations for privacy and security, watch the following
video. https://www.microsoft.com/en-
us/videoplayer/embed/RE4voJF?postJsllMsg=true

Inclusiveness
AI systems should empower everyone and engage people. AI should bring benefits
to all parts of society, regardless of physical ability, gender, sexual orientation,
ethnicity, or other factors.

For more details about considerations for inclusiveness, watch the following video.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/videoplayer/embed/RE4vl9v?postJsllMsg=true

Transparency
AI systems should be understandable. Users should be made fully aware of the

purpose of the system, how it works, and what limitations may be expected. For

more details about considerations for transparency, watch the following video.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/videoplayer/embed/RE4vqfb?postJsllMsg=true

Accountability
People should be accountable for AI systems. Designers and developers of AI-based
solutions should work within a framework of governance and organizational
principles that ensure the solution meets ethical and legal standards that are clearly
defined.
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For more details about considerations for accountability, watch the following video.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/videoplayer/embed/RE4vvIk?postJsllMsg=true

The principles of responsible AI can help you understand some of the challenges
facing developers as they try to create ethical AI solutions.
Knowledge check

1. You want to create a model to predict sales of ice cream based on historic
data that includes daily ice cream sales totals and weather measurements. Which
Azure service should you use?

• Azure Machine Learning

• Azure Bot
• Language

2. You are designing an AI application that uses images to detect cracks in car
windshields and warn drivers when a windshield should be repaired or replaced.
What AI workload is described?

• Computer Vision
• Anomaly Detection
• Natural Language Processing

3. A predictive app provides audio output for visually impaired users. Which
principle of Responsible AI is reflected here?

• Transparency
• Inclusiveness
• Fairness

Summary
Artificial Intelligence enables the creation of powerful solutions to many kinds of
problems. AI systems can exhibit human characteristics to analyze the world around
them, make predictions or inferences, and act on them in ways that we could only
imagine a short time ago.
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With this power, comes responsibility. As developers of AI solutions, we must apply

principles that ensure that everyone benefits from AI without disadvantaging any
individual or section of society.