Added the four automata-level metrics to the TM diagnostics kit (settledness, clause diversity, churn, vote disagreement) plus a state histogram, a per-input confidence table and a one-line health summary, and validated them on a learnable-vs-noise pair. STATE CONVENTIONS, read off OUR code rather than from memory: range [-nStates, nStates] as int16; nStates = 64 for tm_pattern, 32 for tsetlin initial value 0 = the Exclude boundary INCLUDE iff state > 0; EXCLUDE iff state <= 0 flip boundary sits between state 0 and 1; commitment = abs(st)/nStates in [0,1] === THE GATE, AND A RESULT THAT MATTERS === Case A (learnable planted rule) vs Case B (shuffled labels), 49 bits, N=64: metric A (learnable) B (shuffled) settledness mean 0.970 0.719 churn flip/sample 0.000055 FALLING 0.000788 FLAT clause-change/sample 0.00263 falling 0.0595 flat diversity (Jaccard) 0.176 0.014 disagreement 0.003 0.298 verdict settling mixed (NOT settling) **SETTLEDNESS ALONE DOES NOT WORK.** On noise the automata still COMMIT (0.719) - they just commit to the wrong thing. The decisive separators are **churn TREND (falling vs flat)** and **vote DISAGREEMENT (0.003 vs 0.298)**. Had we built only the settledness metric - the one that seems most obvious - we would have been misled. That is now recorded in the README. INERTIA SWEEP: A vs B separate at N=16/32/64/128. **Raising N raises A's commitment but does NOT reduce B's noise-fitting** - so more inertia does not rescue a noise-fitting TM. === REAL READING ON THE SHIPPED GUN, AND THE INFERENCE IT SUPPORTS === tm_pattern GF head over the DrussGT fixtures: settledness 0.484 (settling), diversity 0.267 (moderate), churn 0.094/100 FALLING, disagreement 0.145 (coherent). **VERDICT: SETTLING** - not fidgeting, not collapsed. Constant inputs flagged: 38/39 (the known never-written bits) plus 19/36/37. Context: pooled warm accuracy 35.72% vs 34.24% majority = +1.48pp. So: **the old gun was NOT failing because of inertia or instability - it settled properly and its settled rules still barely beat a lazy guess.** Its settledness (0.484) is LOWER than both synthetic cases (0.97/0.72), which is the signature of WEAK OR CONFLICTING SIGNAL rather than too much inertia. CONCLUSION: **N and s are not the observed bottleneck. The target/representation is.** That is exactly why the new design changes the target and the label pipeline rather than sweeping knobs - and it means we should NOT spend effort on an N/s sweep expecting it to fix anything. Also adds `diag_automata_validation.nim` (Case A/B/C + inertia sweep) and `test_tm_automata_diag.nim` (55 pure checks); `test_tm_diag` 48 and `diag_synthetic` 17 still pass, plus all other guards. acceptance_offline_vs_online was NOT run (it needs a live battle and there is no tm_diag dependency). Caveat: churn on the real gun is a PROXY (a tm_core retrain over captured samples in live order) because the live gun exposes no per-sample state trace; the other metrics are read directly off the exported teams.
tm_diag — the Tsetlin diagnostics kit
First-class, offline diagnostics for a Tsetlin-Machine head. Answers the two questions that clause-reading alone cannot:
Is the TM learning badly, or is the data bad?
Built before the new TM gun, so a bad design cannot hide behind the data and a bad dataset cannot hide behind the model.
Everything is pure and offline — no battles, no Java, no harness.
Files
| file | contents |
|---|---|
feature_spec.nim |
FeatureSpec, describe, describeClause, draftTMSpec() (49-bit draft), tmPatternSpec() (40-bit shipped encoding) |
tm_core.nim |
compact deterministic Granmo Table 2/3 multiclass TM (mirrors the tm_pattern core), introspectable clause layout |
diagnostics.nim |
the seven groups (re-exports the two above) |
Import everything with:
import tm_diag/diagnostics
Task 1 — named features / clause rendering
let spec = draftTMSpec() # 49 bits, all one-hot
spec.nBits # 49
spec.describe(45) # "lat DEAD-ON -18..+18"
spec.describeLiteral(49 + 45) # "NOT lat DEAD-ON -18..+18"
spec.describeClause(@[0, 45], 2) # "IF dist-wall<50 AND lat DEAD-ON -18..+18 THEN class=2"
spec.describeClause(@[], 1) # "IF TRUE (empty clause) THEN class=1"
A block is added with addBlock(name, count, bitNames?); a bit with no explicit
name renders as blockName[k], and a single-bit block renders as its name.
tmPatternSpec() mirrors guns/tm_pattern.nim's tmBuildBits exactly. Its two
last bits (UNUSED-38/39) are a real bug: tmBuildBits writes only 38 raw
bits into an array[TM_NBITS=40, uint8], so bits 38 and 39 are always 0 and
their negations always 1. The kit reports them as constant dead inputs.
Task 2 — the six groups
All functions take a trained TmMachine (or an externally supplied clause set)
plus seq[DiagSample] where DiagSample.lits is the pos-then-neg literal vector
and DiagSample.label the true class.
# build samples from raw bits
let s = makeSample(nBits, rawBits, label, order)
# 1. pre-flight DATA checks
let dc = dataChecks(labels, nClasses, threshold = 0.30)
# dc.classCounts, dc.classShares, dc.majorityClass, dc.majorityShare,
# dc.majorityAccuracy, dc.overThreshold, dc.flags
let sc = shuffledLabelControl(tmplMachine, samples) # (acc, majority, ...)
# 2. clause introspection
let infos = clauseInfo(m, samples, spec)
let summ = clauseSummary(infos) # empty / neverFired / length hist
for c in topClauses(infos, 10): echo c.text, " votes=", c.votes
for cb in clauseBalanceByClass(infos, nClasses): echo cb
for cl in 0..<nClasses: # recover the class rule
echo spec.describeClause(necessaryLiterals(m, samples, cl), cl)
# 3. per-feature contribution + DEAD-INPUT LIST
let contribs = featureContributions(m, samples, spec)
let dead = deadInputs(contribs) # weighted < 5% of top, or never used
let strict = neverUsedInputs(contribs) # appearances == 0
let consts = constantInputs(samples, nBits)
for c in rankedInputs(contribs)[0..<10]: echo c.name, " ", c.weighted
# 4. accuracy diagnostics
let ad = accuracyDiagnostics(m, samples)
# ad.acc, ad.majorityBaseline, ad.margin, ad.confusion,
# ad.perClassRecall/Precision, ad.predMajorityShare
# 5. learning curve
let lc = learningCurve(tmplMachine, train, eval, nPoints = 10)
# lc.points, lc.accs, lc.trend ("flat" | "rising" | "rising-then-falling ...")
# 6. ablation hooks
let base = ablateBaseline(tmplMachine, train, eval)
for r in ablateDropAllBlocks(tmplMachine, train, eval, spec): echo r.name, r.delta
let rs = ablateScrambleFeature(tmplMachine, train, eval, spec, bit)
ablation retrains a fresh machine per variant (the strongest form of "does this
input earn its bits"). Pass baselineAcc from ablateBaseline to avoid
recomputing it per block.
Task 5 — the AUTOMATA level (settledness / diversity / churn / disagreement)
Task 2 reads the clauses. Task 5 reads the automata inside them: one
automaton per input bit per clause, each holding a state that says how
confident it is that its bit belongs in the clause. These are what tell us
whether the TM is locking onto the enemy or just fidgeting, and whether the
inertia N (the number of automata states) should go up or down.
State conventions — from the ACTUAL code, not the textbook
Derived from tm_core.nim and guns/tm_pattern.nim (tmEval, tmLearnDir,
tmNewTeam, resetMachine):
| property | value |
|---|---|
| state range | [-nStates, nStates] (int16); nStates = 64 for tm_pattern, 32 for tsetlin.nim |
| initial value | 0 (both cores call it "the Exclude boundary") |
| INCLUDE | state > 0 (tmEval / clauseLits) |
| EXCLUDE | state <= 0 |
| flip boundary | BETWEEN state 0 and state 1 — the middle of the range |
commitment(st) |
abs(st) / nStates in [0,1]: 0 on the boundary, 1 at either extreme |
So a flip is exactly a change in the predicate state > 0.
The four metrics
- SETTLEDNESS — per clause and overall, the mean
commitmentand the fraction of automata settled at/above a threshold (default0.5). High and rising as training proceeds is healthy; low means the clause is wavering noise.settledness(m, threshold),settlednessTrend(early, late). - CLAUSE DIVERSITY — mean pairwise Jaccard of the included-literal sets,
within the same polarity. Low-to-moderate is healthy; ~1.0 = all clauses are
one rule in 50 hats; ~0 = memorising ticks. Empty clauses carry no rule and
are skipped by default.
clauseDiversity(m, skipEmpty = true),jaccard(a,b). - CHURN — both levels, per training sample: the fraction of automata
crossing the flip boundary, and the fraction of clauses whose
included-literal set changed. High early and falling is healthy; flat-high
= fidgeting; zero from the start = never learned.
churnTrace(tmpl, samples, epochs, seed, window, shuffle).shuffle = falsereplays the given (temporal) order, mirroring a live gun. - VOTE DISAGREEMENT — per class, over the samples where it casts a vote:
the fraction of firing clauses whose polarity disagrees with the sign of the
class's total vote. Low is healthy.
voteDisagreement(m, samples).
The three readouts that make it readable
- state histogram — the distribution of automata states across the range:
stateHistogram(m, nBins),histogramText(h). - per-input confidence table — for each bit, the mean commitment of its
automata (and a
constantflag for zero-variance inputs):perInputConfidence(m, spec, samples, threshold),rankedInputConfidence(conf). - one-line health summary —
healthLine(ad)givessettledness / diversity / churn trend / disagreement, each with its own verdict word (settling,fidgeting,frozen,coherent, ...), andautomataVerdict(ad)reduces the trajectory to one word.formatAutomataReport(ad)prints everything.
API
import tm_diag/diagnostics
let ad = automataDiagnostics(tmpl, samples, spec,
epochs = 15, seed = 777,
settleThreshold = 0.5, nHistBins = 9,
window = 100, measureChurn = true)
# ad.machine, ad.settledness, ad.diversity, ad.churn, ad.disagreement,
# ad.histogram, ad.inputConfidence, ad.summary
echo ad.summary # one line
echo automataVerdict(ad) # "settling" | "fidgeting" | "collapsed" | ...
echo formatAutomataReport(ad) # the full readout
For a machine you already have (e.g. the shipped gun's exportTeams()), call
settledness / clauseDiversity / stateHistogram / perInputConfidence /
voteDisagreement directly and churnTrace on a fresh copy.
Validation — Case A (learnable) vs Case B (noise)
common_libs/tests/diag_automata_validation.nim uses the planted rule from
diag_synthetic.nim and the SAME inputs with shuffled labels. Measured
(nBits=49, 3 classes, 40 clauses, nStates=64, 3000 samples, 15 epochs):
| metric | Case A (learnable) | Case B (noise) |
|---|---|---|
| settledness mean | 0.970 | 0.719 |
| settled fraction | 0.999 | 0.799 |
| churn trend | falling (2.5e-4 -> 2e-6) |
flat (1.0e-3 -> 7.2e-4) |
| clause-change trend | falling (0.011 -> 2.3e-4) |
flat (0.069 -> 0.057) |
| diversity (overall Jaccard) | 0.176 | 0.014 |
| disagreement | 0.003 | 0.298 |
| verdict | settling | mixed (not settling) |
Case A settledness RISES 0.475 (early prefix) -> 0.970 (full). The pair
separates learning from fidgeting: the decisive signals are the churn trend
(falling vs flat) and disagreement (0.003 vs 0.298). Settledness alone is NOT
enough — on noise the automata still commit (0.719), just to the wrong thing.
Case C (a forced-constant bit) is flagged: perInputConfidence(...).constant
and constantInputs both surface it. Note a constant bit can show HIGH
commitment (one literal is always 1), so the constant flag is what
disambiguates.
Inertia sweep (N = nStates, 10 epochs)
The validation also sweeps N to see whether inertia moves the metrics:
| N | Case A settled | A churn | A dis. | Case B settled | B churn | B dis. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 16 | 0.904 | falling | 0.003 | 0.720 | flat | 0.363 |
| 32 | 0.943 | falling | 0.000 | 0.700 | flat | 0.388 |
| 64 | 0.970 | falling | 0.003 | 0.715 | flat | 0.368 |
| 128 | 0.971 | falling | 0.000 | 0.660 | flat | 0.304 |
A and B are separated at EVERY N (churn falling vs flat, disagreement low vs high). Raising N only raises Case A's commitment (0.90 -> 0.97); it does NOT reduce noise-fitting in Case B. So inertia is not the discriminator the metrics identify — the churn trend and disagreement are.
Real reading — the shipped tm_pattern GF head
diag_tm_pattern_offline.nim over the committed DrussGT fixtures (automata read
directly off the exported teams from tr_drussgt_vs_modularbot; churn measured
on a tm_core temporal one-pass proxy, live-order):
- settledness 0.484 (
settling), settled fraction 0.453 - diversity 0.267 (
moderate) — positive 0.170, negative 0.322 - churn 0.094/100 per sample, FALLING (0.00208 -> 0.00048); clause-change 5.31/100, falling
- disagreement 0.145 (
coherent) - verdict: settling — not fidgeting, not collapsed
- constant inputs flagged: bits 38/39 (the known never-written ones) plus 19/36/37 in this fixture
- context: pooled warm accuracy 35.72% vs the 34.24% majority = +1.48pp
The gun settles onto the within-battle labels but its settled rules barely beat
the majority class, which points at the TARGET / representation rather than the
inertia N. See the Task 5 report for the inertia discussion.
The default-off real-gun hook
guns/tm_pattern.nim gained only additive, default-off instrumentation:
g.diagCapture = true # default false; no behaviour change when false
# ... replay ...
g.diagSamples # seq[TmDiagSample] (literal vector + label)
g.exportTeams() # read-only GF clause teams
g.exportRadTeams(); g.exportRevTeams()
To introspect an externally trained clause set:
let m = machineFromTeams(TM_NBITS, TM_CLASSES, TM_NCLAUSES, TM_NSTATES, TM_S,
g.exportTeams())
Running the demos / tests
nim c -r -d:release --path:common_libs common_libs/tests/test_tm_diag.nim # 48 pure unit checks
nim c -r --path:common_libs common_libs/tests/test_tm_automata_diag.nim # 55 automata-metric unit checks
nim c -r -d:release --path:common_libs common_libs/tests/diag_synthetic.nim # Task 3 proof (17 checks)
nim c -r -d:release --path:common_libs common_libs/tests/diag_automata_validation.nim # Task 5 A/B/C proof
nim c -r -d:release --path:common_libs common_libs/tests/diag_tm_pattern_offline.nim # Task 4 real reading
See common_libs/tests/diag_synthetic.nim for the ground-truth validation and
common_libs/tests/diag_tm_pattern_offline.nim for the real reading.