The Encog Workbench

    The Encog workbench can be downloaded from the following URL:

http://www.encog.org

    There are several different ways that the Encog Workbench is packaged. Depending on your computer system, you should choose one of the following:

• Universal – Packaged with shell scripts and batch files to launch the workbench under UNIX, Macintosh or Windows.
• Windows Application – Packaged with a Windows launcher. Simply double click the application executable and the application will start.
• Macintosh Application – Packaged with a Macintosh launcher. Simply double click the application icon and the application will start.

    In this chapter I will assume that you are using the Windows Application package of Encog Workbench. The others will all operate very similarly. Once you download the Encog workbench and unzip it to a directory, the directory will look similar to Figure 4.1.

Figure 4.1: The Encog Workbench Folder

     To launch the Encog workbench double click the “Encog Workbench” icon. This will launch the Encog Workbench application. Once the workbench starts, you will see something similar to what is illustrated in Figure 4.2.

Figure 4.2: The Encog Workbench Application

    The Encog Workbench can run a benchmark to determine how fast Encog will run on this machine. This may take several minutes, as it runs Encog through a number of different neural network operations. The benchmark is also a good way to make sure that Encog is functioning properly on a computer. To run the benchmark, click the “Tools” menu and select “Benchmark Encog”. The benchmark will run and display a progress bar. Once the benchmark is done, you will see the final benchmark number. This can be seen in Figure 4.3.

Figure 4.3: Benchmarking Encog

    A lower number reflects a better score. The number is the amount of seconds that it took Encog to complete the benchmark tasks. Each part of the benchmark is run multiple times to try to produce consistent benchmark numbers. Encog's use of multicore processors will be reflected in this number. If the computer is already running other processes, this will slow down the benchmark. Because of this, you should not have other applications running while performing a benchmark using the Encog Workbench.