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thesis/chapters/1_introduction.tex
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\chapter{Introduction}
Artificial intelligence (AI) techniques have recently started enjoying widespread industry awareness and adoption; the use of AI is increasingly prevalent in all sectors \cite{wirtz2019artificial,bosch2021engineering}. The reasons behind this are manifold \cite{jordan2015machine}, to name a few: recent breakthroughs in deep-learning, increased public awareness, abundance of available data, access to powerful low-cost commodity hardware, education, but most interestingly, the rise of high-level libraries making ready-to-use state-of-the-art (SOTA) models easily available. The latter practically abolishes the barrier of entry for applying AI --- and with that --- can help use-cases in many areas.
Artificial intelligence techniques have recently started enjoying widespread industry awareness and adoption; the use of AI is increasingly prevalent in all sectors \cite{wirtz2019artificial,bosch2021engineering}. The reasons behind this are manifold \cite{jordan2015machine}, to name a few: recent breakthroughs in deep learning (DL), increased public awareness, abundance of available data, access to powerful low-cost commodity hardware, education, but most interestingly, the rise of high-level libraries making ready-to-use state-of-the-art (SOTA) models easily available. The latter practically abolishes the barrier of entry for applying AI --- and with that --- can help use cases in various areas.
However, the successful integration of AI components into production-ready applications demands strong engineering methods in order to achieve robust deployments \cite{serban2020adoption}. That is why it is as important as ever to also focus on the quality and robustness of deployed models and software. For instance, the lack of a proper overview of the data transformation steps may lead to suboptimal performance and to introducing unintended biases which may contribute to the ever-increasing negative externality of misused AI \cite{o2016weapons}.
However, the successful integration of AI components into production-ready applications demands strong engineering methods in order to achieve robust deployments \cite{serban2020adoption}. That is why it is as important as ever to also focus on the quality and robustness of deployed models and software. For instance, the lack of a proper overview of data transformation steps may lead to suboptimal performance and to introducing unintended biases which might contribute to the ever-increasing negative externality of misused AI \cite{o2016weapons}.
Concerningly, a peculiar tendency seems to be unfolding: even though industry professionals already have access to numerous frameworks for deploying AI correctly and responsibly, case studies and developer surveys have found that a considerable fraction of deployments do not follow best practices \cite{serban2020adoption,haakman2021ai,amershi2019software,de2019understanding,sculley2015hidden}. Utilising state-of-the-art machine-learning (ML) models has become reasonably simple; applying them properly is as difficult and nuanced as ever.
Concerningly, a peculiar tendency seems to be unfolding: even though industry professionals already have access to numerous frameworks for deploying AI correctly and responsibly, case studies and developer surveys have found that a considerable fraction of deployments do not follow best practices \cite{serban2020adoption,haakman2021ai,amershi2019software,de2019understanding,sculley2015hidden}. Utilising state-of-the-art machine learning (ML) models has become reasonably simple; applying them properly is as difficult and nuanced as ever.
This thesis sets out to investigate the reasons behind the apparent asymmetry between the adoption of accessible AI libraries and existing reusable solutions for robust AI deployments. It is hypothesised that the primary reason for the underwhelming adoption rate of best practices is the short supply of professionals equally proficient in the domains of both data science and software engineering. Nevertheless, even without their presence, practitioners could rely on frameworks for automated mature deployment processes. However, the barrier of entry for using such existing libraries is too high, especially when compared with the complexity of AI-libraries.
This thesis is set out to investigate the reasons behind the apparent asymmetry between industry adoption of accessible AI-libraries and existing reusable solutions for robust AI deployments. It is hypothesised that the primary reason for the underwhelming adoption rate of best practices is the short supply of professionals equally proficient in the domains of both data science and software engineering. Nevertheless, even without their presence, practitioners could rely on frameworks for automated mature deployment processes. However, the barrier of entry for using such existing libraries is too high, especially when compared with the simplicity of AI-libraries.
Therefore, a software framework --- called \textit{GreatAI}\footnote{\href{https://github.com/schmelczer/great-ai}{github.com/schmelczer/great-ai}} --- is designed and its design is presented in this thesis. The principal motivation behind the construction of \textit{GreatAI} is to facilitate the responsible and robust deployment of algorithms and models by designing an accessible API in an attempt to overcome the practical drawbacks of other, similar frameworks. Its name stands for its main aim: to assist easily creating \underline{G}eneral \underline{R}obust \underline{E}nd-to-end \underline{A}utomated, and \underline{T}rustworthy AI deployments.
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\section{Research questions}
I hypothesise that facilitating the adoption of AI deployment best practices is viable by finding less complex framework designs which are easier to adopt in order to decrease the negative externality of misused AI. This paper is set out to investigate this hypothesis by answering the following research questions.
I hypothesise that facilitating the adoption of AI deployment best practices is viable by finding less complex framework designs which are easier to adopt in order to decrease the negative externality of misused AI. This paper sets out to investigate the hypothesis by answering the following research questions.
\begin{rqlist}
\item To what extent does the complexity of AI deployment hinder industrial applications?
\item To what extent does the complexity of deploying AI hinders industrial applications?
\item What API design techniques can be effectively applied in order to decrease the complexity of correctly deploying AI services?
\item To what extent can \textit{GreatAI} automatically implement AI deployment best practices?
\item How adequate is the design of \textit{GreatAI} for helping to apply best practices in other contexts?
\item How suitable is the design of \textit{GreatAI} for helping to apply best practices in other contexts?
\end{rqlist}
In this case, complexity refers to the difficulty faced by professionals (data scientists and software engineers alike) when integrating libraries with their solutions. This could also be described as the barrier of entry or steepness of the learning curve. If the aforementioned hypothesis is correct, the adoption of best practices can be efficiently increased by decreasing this complexity.
In this case, complexity refers to the difficulty faced by professionals (Data Scientists and Software Engineers alike) when integrating third-party libraries with their solutions. This could also be described as the barrier of entry or steepness of the learning curve. If the aforementioned hypothesis is correct, the adoption of best practices can be efficiently increased by decreasing this complexity. AI deployment best practices entail the technical steps ought to be taken in order to achieve robust, end-to-end, automated, and trustworthy deployments. These are detailed in Section \ref{section:requirements}.
AI deployment best practices entail the technical steps that ought to be taken in order to achieve robust, end-to-end, automated, and trustworthy deployments. These are detailed in Section \ref{section:requirements}.
The existence question regarding the problem itself (\textbf{RQ1}) is answered by reviewing the literature of the more than 30 published case studies. \textbf{RQ2} and \textbf{RQ3} are closely connected, the design and evaluation phases utilised to answer them follow an iterative process. They are examined in Chapter \ref{chapter:design} and Chapter \ref{chapter:case} respectively. The final evaluation step is to ascertain the capability of the framework design to generalise beyond a single subdomain and problem context. This question, \textbf{RQ4}, is investigated through interviews with industry professionals in Chapter \ref{chapter:interviews}.
The existence question regarding the problem itself (\textbf{RQ1}) is answered by reviewing the literature of more than 30 published case studies in Chapter \ref{chapter:background}. \textbf{RQ2} and \textbf{RQ3} are closely connected, the design and evaluation phases utilised to answer them follow an iterative process. They are examined in Chapters \ref{chapter:design} and \ref{chapter:case} respectively. The final evaluation step is to ascertain the capability of the framework's design to generalise beyond a single subdomain and problem context. This question, \textbf{RQ4}, is investigated through interviews with industry professionals in Chapter \ref{section:interviews}.
\section{Structure}
The rest of the thesis is organised as follows: Chapter \ref{chapter:background} approaches the problem and the state-of-the-art from three perspectives: the trends of AI library API designs, the experiences gained from practical applications, and a comparison of existing deployment options. Next, the methodology utilised for the subsequent chapters is described in Chapter \ref{chapter:methods}. The design cycle is broken into two chapters, Chapter \ref{chapter:design} and \ref{chapter:case}. The former clarifies the scope and describes the design principles, while the latter details the specifics of the practical case study, the framework's interaction with it, and technological contributions of the novel design. The results are further validated by conducting interviews with industry professionals in Chapter \ref{chapter:interviews}. The thesis is concluded in Chapter \ref{chapter:conclusion}.
The rest of the thesis is organised as follows: Chapter \ref{chapter:background} approaches the problem and the state-of-the-art from three perspectives: the recent trends of AI-library API designs, the experiences gained from practical applications, and a comparison of existing deployment options. Next, the methodology utilised for the subsequent chapters is described in Chapter \ref{chapter:methods}. The design cycle is broken into two chapters, Chapter \ref{chapter:design} and \ref{chapter:case}. The former clarifies the scope and describes the design principles, while the latter details the specifics of the practical case study, the framework's interaction with it. The contributions of the novel design and obtained results are shown and further validated by conducting interviews with industry professionals in Chapter \ref{chapter:interviews}. The thesis is concluded in Chapter \ref{chapter:conclusion}.