Book Image

The Reinforcement Learning Workshop

By : Alessandro Palmas, Emanuele Ghelfi, Dr. Alexandra Galina Petre, Mayur Kulkarni, Anand N.S., Quan Nguyen, Aritra Sen, Anthony So, Saikat Basak
Book Image

The Reinforcement Learning Workshop

By: Alessandro Palmas, Emanuele Ghelfi, Dr. Alexandra Galina Petre, Mayur Kulkarni, Anand N.S., Quan Nguyen, Aritra Sen, Anthony So, Saikat Basak

Overview of this book

Various intelligent applications such as video games, inventory management software, warehouse robots, and translation tools use reinforcement learning (RL) to make decisions and perform actions that maximize the probability of the desired outcome. This book will help you to get to grips with the techniques and the algorithms for implementing RL in your machine learning models. Starting with an introduction to RL, youÔÇÖll be guided through different RL environments and frameworks. YouÔÇÖll learn how to implement your own custom environments and use OpenAI baselines to run RL algorithms. Once youÔÇÖve explored classic RL techniques such as Dynamic Programming, Monte Carlo, and TD Learning, youÔÇÖll understand when to apply the different deep learning methods in RL and advance to deep Q-learning. The book will even help you understand the different stages of machine-based problem-solving by using DARQN on a popular video game Breakout. Finally, youÔÇÖll find out when to use a policy-based method to tackle an RL problem. By the end of The Reinforcement Learning Workshop, youÔÇÖll be equipped with the knowledge and skills needed to solve challenging problems using reinforcement learning.
Table of Contents (14 chapters)
Preface
Free Chapter
2
2. Markov Decision Processes and Bellman Equations

Summary

In this chapter, we started with an introduction to deep learning, and we looked at the different components of the deep learning process. Then, we learned how to build deep learning models using PyTorch.

Next, we slowly shifted our focus to RL, where we learned about value functions and Q learning. We demonstrated how Q learning can help us to build RL solutions without knowing the transition dynamics of the environment. We also investigated the problems associated with tabular Q learning and how to solve those performance and memory-related issues with deep Q learning.

Then, we looked into the issues related to a vanilla DQN implementation and how we can use a target network and experience replay mechanism to overcome issues such as correlated data and non-stationary targets during the training of a DQN. Finally, we learned how double deep Q learning helps us to overcome the issue of overestimation in a DQN. In the next chapter, you will learn how to use CNNs and RNNs...