Combining train + test data and running cross validation in R - r

Question

I have the following R code that runs a simple xgboost model on a set of training and test data with the intention of predicting a binary outcome.
We start by
1) Reading in the relevant libraries.
library(xgboost)
library(readr)
library(caret)
2) Cleaning up the training and test data
train.raw = read.csv("train_data", header = TRUE, sep = ",")
drop = c('column')
train.df = train.raw[, !(names(train.raw) %in% drop)]
train.df[,'outcome'] = as.factor(train.df[,'outcome'])
test.raw = read.csv("test_data", header = TRUE, sep = ",")
drop = c('column')
test.df = test.raw[, !(names(test.raw) %in% drop)]
test.df[,'outcome'] = as.factor(test.df[,'outcome'])
train.c1 = subset(train.df , outcome == 1)
train.c0 = subset(train.df , outcome == 0)
3) Running XGBoost on the properly formatted data.
train_xgb = xgb.DMatrix(data.matrix(train.df [,1:124]), label = train.raw[, "outcome"])
test_xgb = xgb.DMatrix(data.matrix(test.df[,1:124]))
4) Running the model
model_xgb = xgboost(data = train_xgb, nrounds = 8, max_depth = 5, eta = .1, eval_metric = "logloss", objective = "binary:logistic", verbose = 5)
5) Making predicitions
pred_xgb <- predict(model_xgb, newdata = test_xgb)
My question is: How can I adjust this process so that I'm just pulling in / adjusting a single 'training' data set, and getting predictions on the hold-out sets of the cross-validated file?

Answer 1

To specify k-fold CV in the xgboost call one needs to call xgb.cv with nfold = some integer argument, to save the predictions for each resample use prediction = TRUE argument. For instance:
xgboostModelCV <- xgb.cv(data = dtrain,
nrounds = 1688,
nfold = 5,
objective = "binary:logistic",
eval_metric= "auc",
metrics = "auc",
verbose = 1,
print_every_n = 50,
stratified = T,
scale_pos_weight = 2
max_depth = 6,
eta = 0.01,
gamma=0,
colsample_bytree = 1 ,
min_child_weight = 1,
subsample= 0.5 ,
prediction = T)
xgboostModelCV$pred #contains predictions in the same order as in dtrain.
xgboostModelCV$folds #contains k-fold samples
Here's a decent function to pick hyperparams
function(train, seed){
require(xgboost)
ntrees=2000
searchGridSubCol <- expand.grid(subsample = c(0.5, 0.75, 1),
colsample_bytree = c(0.6, 0.8, 1),
gamma=c(0, 1, 2),
eta=c(0.01, 0.03),
max_depth=c(4,6,8,10))
aucErrorsHyperparameters <- apply(searchGridSubCol, 1, function(parameterList){
#Extract Parameters to test
currentSubsampleRate <- parameterList[["subsample"]]
currentColsampleRate <- parameterList[["colsample_bytree"]]
currentGamma <- parameterList[["gamma"]]
currentEta =parameterList[["eta"]]
currentMaxDepth =parameterList[["max_depth"]]
set.seed(seed)
xgboostModelCV <- xgb.cv(data = train,
nrounds = ntrees,
nfold = 5,
objective = "binary:logistic",
eval_metric= "auc",
metrics = "auc",
verbose = 1,
print_every_n = 50,
early_stopping_rounds = 200,
stratified = T,
scale_pos_weight=sum(all_data_nobad[index_no_bad,1]==0)/sum(all_data_nobad[index_no_bad,1]==1),
max_depth = currentMaxDepth,
eta = currentEta,
gamma=currentGamma,
colsample_bytree = currentColsampleRate,
min_child_weight = 1,
subsample= currentSubsampleRate)
xvalidationScores <- as.data.frame(xgboostModelCV$evaluation_log)
#Save rmse of the last iteration
auc=xvalidationScores[xvalidationScores$iter==xgboostModelCV$best_iteration,c(1,4,5)]
auc=cbind(auc, currentSubsampleRate, currentColsampleRate, currentGamma, currentEta, currentMaxDepth)
names(auc)=c("iter", "test.auc.mean", "test.auc.std", "subsample", "colsample", "gamma", "eta", "max.depth")
print(auc)
return(auc)
})
return(aucErrorsHyperparameters)
}
You can change the grid values and the params in the grid, as well as loss/evaluation metric. It is similar as provided by caret grid search, but caret does not provide the possibility to define alpha, lambda, colsample_bylevel, num_parallel_tree... hyper parameters in the grid search apart defining a custom function which I found cumbersome. Caret has the advantage of automatic preprocessing, automatic up/down sampling within CV etc.
setting the seed outside the xgb.cv call will pick the same folds for CV but not the same trees at each round so you will end up with a different model. Even if you set the seed inside the xgb.cv function call there is no guarantee you will end up with the same model but there's a much higher chance (depends on threads, type of model.. - I for one like the uncertainty and found it to have little impact on the result).

Answer 2

You can use xgb.cv and set prediction = TRUE.