NVIDIA NeMo Agent toolkit Optimizer Guide#

Welcome to the NeMo Agent toolkit Optimizer guide. This document provides a comprehensive overview of how to use the NeMo Agent toolkit Optimizer to tune your NeMo Agent toolkit workflows.

Introduction#

What is Parameter Optimization?#

Parameter optimization is the process of automatically finding the best combination of settings (parameters) for your NeMo Agent toolkit workflows. Think of it like tuning a musical instrument – you adjust different knobs and strings until you achieve the perfect sound. Similarly, AI workflows have various “knobs” you can adjust:

  • Hyperparameters: Numerical settings that control model behavior (such as temperature, top_p, max_tokens)

  • Prompts: The instructions and context you provide to language models

  • Model choices: Which specific AI models to use for different tasks

  • Processing parameters: Settings that affect how data flows through your workflow

Why Use Parameter Optimization?#

Manual parameter tuning has several challenges:

  1. Time-consuming: Testing different combinations manually can take days or weeks

  2. Suboptimal results: Humans often miss the best combinations due to the vast search space

  3. Lack of reproducibility: Manual tuning is hard to document and reproduce

  4. Complex interactions: Parameters often interact in non-obvious ways

The NeMo Agent toolkit Optimizer solves these problems by:

  • Automating the search process: Tests hundreds of parameter combinations automatically

  • Using intelligent algorithms: Employs proven optimization techniques (Optuna for numerical parameters, genetic algorithms for prompts)

  • Balancing multiple objectives: Optimizes for multiple goals simultaneously (such as accuracy vs. speed)

  • Providing insights: Generates visualizations and reports to help you understand parameter impacts

Real-World Example#

Imagine you’re building a customer service chatbot. You need to optimize:

  • The system prompt to get the right tone and behavior

  • Model parameters like temperature (creativity vs. consistency)

  • Which LLM to use (balancing cost vs. quality)

  • Response length limits

Instead of manually testing hundreds of combinations, the optimizer can find the best settings that maximize customer satisfaction while minimizing response time and cost.

What This Guide Covers#

This guide will walk you through:

  1. Understanding the core concepts (OptimizableField and SearchSpace)

  2. Configuring which parameters to optimize

  3. Setting up the optimization process

  4. Running the optimizer

  5. Interpreting the results and applying them

How it Works#

The NeMo Agent toolkit Optimizer uses a combination of techniques to find the best parameters for your workflow:

  • Numerical Values

    • Optuna is used to optimize numerical values.

  • Prompts

    • A custom genetic algorithm (GA) is used to optimize prompts. It evolves a population of prompt candidates over multiple generations using LLM-powered mutation and optional recombination.

Optimizer Flow Chart

The optimization process follows the steps outlined in the diagram above:

  1. Configuration Loading: The optimizer starts by reading the optimizer section of your workflow configuration file. It uses this to understand your optimization objectives, which parameters are tunable, and the overall optimization strategy.

  2. Study Initialization: An Optuna study is created to manage the optimization process. This study keeps track of all the trials, their parameters, and their resulting scores.

  3. Optimization Loops:

    • Numerical parameters: loop for n_trials_numeric trials (Optuna).

    • Prompt parameters: loop for ga_generations generations (Genetic Algorithm).

  4. Parameter Suggestion: In each numeric trial, Optuna’s sampler suggests a new set of hyperparameters from the SearchSpace you defined with OptimizableField. For prompt optimization, a population of prompts is evolved each generation using LLM-powered mutation and optional recombination guided by the prompt_purpose. No trajectory feedback is used.

  5. Workflow Execution: The NeMo Agent toolkit workflow is executed using the suggested parameters for that trial. This is repeated reps_per_param_set times to ensure the results are statistically stable.

  6. Evaluation: The output of each workflow run is passed to the evaluators defined in the eval_metrics configuration. Each evaluator calculates a score for a specific objective (such as correctness, latency, or creativity).

  7. Recording Results:

    • Numeric trials: scores are combined per multi_objective_combination_mode and recorded in the Optuna study.

    • Prompt GA: each individual’s metrics are normalized per generation and scalarized per multi_objective_combination_mode; the best individuals are checkpointed each generation.

  8. Analysis and Output: Once all trials are complete, the optimizer analyzes the study to find the best-performing trial. It then generates the output files, including best_params.json and the various plots, to help you understand the results.

Before diving into configuration, let’s understand the fundamental concepts that make parameters optimizable.

Core Concepts: OptimizableField and SearchSpace#

The optimizer needs to know two things about each parameter:

  1. Which parameters can be optimized (OptimizableField)

  2. What values to try (SearchSpace)

Understanding OptimizableField#

An OptimizableField is a special type of field in your workflow configuration that tells the optimizer “this parameter can be tuned.” It’s like putting a label on certain knobs saying “you can adjust this.”

For example, in a language model configuration:

  • temperature might be an OptimizableField (can be tuned)

  • api_key would be a regular field (should not be tuned)

Understanding SearchSpaces#

A SearchSpace defines the range or set of possible values for an optimizable parameter. It answers the question: “What values should the optimizer try?”

There are three main types of search spaces:

  1. Continuous Numerical: A range of numbers (e.g., temperature from 0.1 to 0.9)

  2. Discrete/Categorical: A list of specific choices (e.g., model names)

  3. Prompt: Special search space for optimizing text prompts using AI-powered mutations

How They Work Together#

When you mark a field as optimizable and define its search space, you’re telling the optimizer:

  • “This parameter affects my workflow’s performance”

  • “Here are the reasonable values to try”

  • “Find the best value within these constraints”

The optimizer will then systematically explore these search spaces to find the optimal combination.

Implementing OptimizableField#

To make a parameter in your workflow optimizable, you need to use the OptimizableField function instead of Pydantic’s standard Field. This allows you to attach search space metadata to the field. You may omit the space argument to mark a field as optimizable and supply its search space later in the configuration file.

SearchSpace Model#

The SearchSpace Pydantic model is used to define the range or set of possible values for a hyperparameter.

  • values: Sequence[T] | None: Categorical values for a discrete search space. You can either set values. Mutually exclusive with low and high.

  • low: T | None: The lower bound for a numerical parameter.

  • high: T | None: The upper bound for a numerical parameter.

  • log: bool: Whether to use a logarithmic scale for numerical parameters. Defaults to False.

  • step: float: The step size for numerical parameters.

  • is_prompt: bool: Indicates that this field is a prompt to be optimized. Defaults to False.

  • prompt: str: The base prompt to be optimized.

  • prompt_purpose: str: A description of what the prompt is for, used to guide the LLM-based prompt optimizer.

OptimizableField Function#

This function is a drop-in replacement for pydantic.Field that optionally takes a space argument.

Here’s how you can define optimizable fields in your workflow’s data models:

from pydantic import BaseModel

from nat.data_models.function import FunctionBaseConfig
from nat.data_models.optimizable import OptimizableField, SearchSpace, OptimizableMixin

class SomeImageAgentConfig(FunctionBaseConfig, OptimizableMixin, name="some_image_agent_config"):
    quality: int = OptimizableField(
        default=90,
        space=SearchSpace(low=75, high=100)
    )
    sharpening: float = OptimizableField(
        default=0.5,
        space=SearchSpace(low=0.0, high=1.0)
    )
    model_name: str = OptimizableField(
        default="gpt-3.5-turbo",
        space=SearchSpace(values=["gpt-3.5-turbo", "gpt-4", "claude-2"]),
        description="The name of the model to use."
    )
    # Option A: Start from a prompt different from the default (set prompt in space)
    system_prompt_a: str = OptimizableField(
        default="You are a helpful assistant.",
        space=SearchSpace(
            is_prompt=True,
            prompt="You are a concise and safety-aware assistant.",
            prompt_purpose="To guide the behavior of the chatbot."
        ),
        description="The system prompt for the LLM."
    )

    # Option B: Start from the field's default prompt (omit prompt in space)
    system_prompt_b: str = OptimizableField(
        default="You are a helpful assistant.",
        space=SearchSpace(
            is_prompt=True,
            # prompt is intentionally omitted; defaults to the field's default
            prompt_purpose="To guide the behavior of the chatbot."
        ),
        description="The system prompt for the LLM."
    )

    # Option C: Mark as optimizable but provide search space in config
    temperature: float = OptimizableField(0.0)

In this example:

  • quality (int) and sharpening (float) are continuous parameters.

  • model_name is a categorical parameter, and the optimizer will choose from the provided list of models.

  • system_prompt_a demonstrates setting a different starting prompt in the SearchSpace.

  • system_prompt_b demonstrates omitting SearchSpace.prompt, which uses the field’s default as the base prompt.

  • temperature shows how to mark a field as optimizable without specifying a search space in code; the search space must then be provided in the workflow configuration.

Behavior for prompt-optimized fields:

  • If space.is_prompt is true and space.prompt is None, the optimizer will use the OptimizableField’s default as the base prompt.

  • If both space.prompt and the field default are None, an error is raised. Provide at least one.

  • If space is omitted entirely, a corresponding search space must be supplied in the configuration’s search_space mapping; otherwise a runtime error is raised when walking optimizable fields.

Enabling Optimization in Configuration Files#

Once OptimizableFields have been created in your workflow’s data models, you need to enable optimization for these fields in your workflow configuration file. This can be enabled using the optimizable_params field of your configuration file.

For example:

llms:
  nim_llm:
    _type: nim
    model_name: meta/llama-3.1-70b-instruct
    temperature: 0.0
    optimizable_params:
      - temperature
      - top_p
      - max_tokens

NOTE: Ensure your configuration object inherits from OptimizableMixin to enable the optimizable_params field.

Overriding Search Spaces in Configuration Files#

You can override the search space for any optimizable parameter directly in your workflow configuration by adding a search_space mapping alongside optimizable_params:

llms:
  nim_llm:
    _type: nim
    model_name: meta/llama-3.1-70b-instruct
    temperature: 0.0
    optimizable_params: [temperature, top_p]
    search_space:
      temperature:
        low: 0.2
        high: 0.8
        step: 0.2
      top_p:
        low: 0.5
        high: 1.0
        step: 0.1

The search_space entries are parsed into SearchSpace objects and override any defaults defined in the data models. If a field is marked as optimizable but lacks a search_space in both the data model and this mapping, the optimizer will raise an error when collecting optimizable fields.

Default Optimizable LLM Parameters#

Many of the LLM providers in the NeMo Agent Toolkit come with pre-configured optimizable parameters. This means you can start tuning common hyperparameters like temperature and top_p without any extra configuration.

Here is a matrix of the default optimizable parameters for some of the built-in LLM providers:

Parameter

Provider

Default Value

Search Space

temperature

openai

0.0

low=0.1, high=0.8, step=0.2

nim

0.0

low=0.1, high=0.8, step=0.2

top_p

openai

1.0

low=0.5, high=1.0, step=0.1

nim

1.0

low=0.5, high=1.0, step=0.1

max_tokens

nim

300

low=128, high=2176, step=512

To use these defaults, you just need to enable numeric optimization in your config.yml. The optimizer will automatically find these OptimizableFields in the LLM configuration and start tuning them. You can always override these defaults by defining your own OptimizableField on the LLM configuration in your workflow.

Optimizer Configuration#

Now that you understand how to make fields optimizable, let’s look at how to configure the optimization process itself.

The optimizer is configured through an optimizer section in your workflow’s YAML configuration file. This configuration is mapped to the OptimizerConfig and OptimizerMetric Pydantic models.

Here is an example of an optimizer section in a YAML configuration file:

optimizer:
  output_path: "optimizer_results"

  # Numeric (Optuna)
  numeric:
    enabled: true
    n_trials: 50

  # Prompt (Genetic Algorithm)
  prompt:
    enabled: true
    prompt_population_init_function: "prompt_optimizer"
    prompt_recombination_function: "prompt_recombiner"  # optional
    ga_population_size: 16
    ga_generations: 8
    ga_offspring_size: 12        # optional; defaults to pop_size - elitism
    ga_crossover_rate: 0.7
    ga_mutation_rate: 0.2
    ga_elitism: 2
    ga_selection_method: "tournament"  # or "roulette"
    ga_tournament_size: 3
    ga_parallel_evaluations: 8
    ga_diversity_lambda: 0.0

  # Evaluation
  reps_per_param_set: 5
  eval_metrics:
    latency:
      evaluator_name: "latency"
      direction: "minimize"
      weight: 0.2
    correctness:
      evaluator_name: "correctness"
      direction: "maximize"
      weight: 0.8

OptimizerConfig#

This is the main configuration object for the optimizer.

  • output_path: Path | None: The directory where optimization results will be saved, for example, optimizer_results/. Defaults to None.

  • eval_metrics: dict[str, OptimizerMetric] | None: A dictionary of evaluation metrics to optimize. The keys are custom names for the metrics, and the values are OptimizerMetric objects.

  • numeric.enabled: bool: Enable numeric optimization (Optuna). Defaults to true.

  • numeric.n_trials: int: Number of numeric trials. Defaults to 20.

  • prompt.enabled: bool: Enable GA-based prompt optimization. Defaults to false.

  • prompt.ga_population_size: int: Population size for GA prompt optimization. Larger populations increase diversity but cost more per generation. Defaults to 10.

  • prompt.ga_generations: int: Number of generations for GA prompt optimization. Replaces n_trials_prompt. Defaults to 5.

  • prompt.ga_offspring_size: int | null: Number of offspring produced per generation. If null, defaults to ga_population_size - ga_elitism.

  • prompt.ga_crossover_rate: float: Probability of recombination between two parents for each prompt parameter. Defaults to 0.7.

  • prompt.ga_mutation_rate: float: Probability of mutating a child’s prompt parameter using the LLM optimizer. Defaults to 0.1.

  • prompt.ga_elitism: int: Number of elite individuals copied unchanged to the next generation. Defaults to 1.

  • prompt.ga_selection_method: str: Parent selection scheme. tournament (default) or roulette.

  • prompt.ga_tournament_size: int: Tournament size when ga_selection_method is tournament. Defaults to 3.

  • prompt.ga_parallel_evaluations: int: Maximum number of concurrent evaluations. Controls async concurrency. Defaults to 8.

  • prompt.ga_diversity_lambda: float: Diversity penalty strength to discourage duplicate prompt sets. 0.0 disables it. Defaults to 0.0.

  • prompt.prompt_population_init_function: str | null: Function name used to mutate base prompts to seed the initial population and perform mutations. The NeMo Agent Toolkit includes a built-in prompt_init Function located in the register file you can use in your configurations.

  • prompt.prompt_recombination_function: str | null: Optional function name used to recombine two parent prompts into a child prompt. The NeMo Agent Toolkit includes a built-in prompt_recombiner Function located in the register file you can use in your configurations.

  • reps_per_param_set: int: The number of times to run the workflow for each set of parameters to get a more stable evaluation. This is important for noisy evaluations where the result might vary even with the same parameters. Defaults to 3.

  • target: float | None: If set, the optimization will stop when the combined score for a trial reaches this value. This is useful if you have a specific performance target and want to save time. The score is normalized between 0 and 1. Defaults to None.

  • multi_objective_combination_mode: str: How to combine multiple objective scores into a single scalar. Supported: harmonic, sum, chebyshev. Defaults to harmonic.

OptimizerMetric#

This model defines a single metric to be used in the optimization.

  • evaluator_name: str: The name of the evaluator to use for this metric. This should correspond to a registered evaluator in the system.

  • direction: str: The direction of optimization. Must be either maximize or minimize.

  • weight: float: The weight of this metric in the multi-objective optimization. The weights will be normalized. Defaults to 1.0.

How Genetic Prompt Optimization Works in Practice#

  1. Start with an initial population of prompt variations

  2. Evaluate each prompt’s performance using your metrics

  3. Select the best performers as parents

  4. Create new prompts through mutation and crossover

  5. Replace the old population with the new one

  6. Repeat until you find optimal prompts

This evolutionary approach is particularly effective for prompt optimization because it can explore creative combinations while gradually improving performance.

Before diving into prompt optimization, let’s clarify the genetic algorithm (GA) terminology used throughout this guide. Genetic algorithms are inspired by natural evolution and use biological metaphors:

Key GA Concepts#

Population: A collection of candidate solutions (in our case, different prompt variations). Think of it as a group of individuals, each representing a different approach to solving your problem.

Individual: A single candidate solution - one specific set of prompts being evaluated.

Generation: One iteration of the evolutionary process. Each generation produces a new population based on the performance of the previous one.

Fitness: A score indicating how well an individual performs according to your evaluation metrics. Higher fitness means better performance.

Parents: Individuals selected from the current generation to create new individuals for the next generation. Better-performing individuals are more likely to be selected as parents.

Offspring/Children: New individuals created by combining aspects of parent individuals or by mutating existing ones.

Mutation: Random changes applied to an individual to introduce variety. In prompt optimization, this means using an LLM to intelligently modify prompts.

Crossover/Recombination: Combining features from two parent individuals to create a child. For prompts, this might mean taking the structure from one prompt and the tone from another.

Elitism: Preserving the best individuals from one generation to the next without modification, ensuring we don’t lose good solutions.

Selection Methods:

  • Tournament Selection: Randomly select a small group and choose the best performer

  • Roulette Selection: Select individuals with probability proportional to their fitness

Prompt Optimization with Genetic Algorithm (GA)#

This section explains how the GA evolves prompt parameters when do_prompt_optimization is enabled.

Workflow#

  1. Seed an initial population:

    • The first individual uses your original prompts.

    • The remaining ga_population_size - 1 individuals are created by applying prompt_population_init_function to each prompt parameter with its prompt_purpose.

  2. Evaluate all individuals with your configured eval_metrics and reps_per_param_set. Metrics are averaged per evaluator.

  3. Normalize metrics per generation so that higher is always better, respecting each metric’s direction.

  4. Scalarize normalized scores per multi_objective_combination_mode to compute a fitness value. Optionally subtract a diversity penalty if ga_diversity_lambda > 0.

  5. Create the next generation:

    • Elitism: carry over the top ga_elitism individuals.

    • Selection: choose parents using ga_selection_method (tournament with ga_tournament_size, or roulette).

    • Crossover: with probability ga_crossover_rate, recombine two parent prompts for a parameter using prompt_recombination_function (if provided), otherwise pick from a parent.

    • Mutation: with probability ga_mutation_rate, apply prompt_population_init_function to mutate the child’s parameter.

    • Repeat until the new population reaches ga_population_size (or ga_offspring_size offspring plus elites).

  6. Repeat steps 2–5 for ga_generations generations.

All LLM calls and evaluations are executed asynchronously with a concurrency limit of ga_parallel_evaluations.

🎯 Tuning Guidance

Population and Generations

  • ga_population_size, ga_generations: Increase to explore more of the search space at higher cost.

  • Tip: Start with 10-16 population size and 5-8 generations for quick testing.

Crossover and Mutation

  • ga_crossover_rate: Higher crossover helps combine good parts of prompts.

  • ga_mutation_rate: Higher mutation increases exploration.

  • Tip: Use 0.7 for crossover and 0.2 for mutation as balanced starting points.

Elitism

  • ga_elitism: Preserves top performers; too high can reduce diversity.

  • Tip: Keep at 1-2 for most cases.

Selection Method

  • ga_selection_method, ga_tournament_size: Tournament is robust; larger tournaments increase selection pressure.

  • Tip: Use tournament selection with size 3 for balanced exploration.

Diversity

  • ga_diversity_lambda: Penalizes duplicate prompt sets to encourage variety.

  • Tip: Start at 0.0, increase to 0.2 if seeing too many similar prompts.

Concurrency

  • ga_parallel_evaluations: Tune based on your environment to balance throughput and rate limits.

  • Tip: Start with 8 and increase until hitting rate limits.

Outputs#

During GA prompt optimization, the optimizer saves:

  • optimized_prompts_gen<N>.json: Best prompt set after generation N.

  • optimized_prompts.json: Final best prompt set after all generations.

  • ga_history_prompts.csv: Per-individual fitness and metric history across generations.

Numeric optimization outputs (Optuna) remain unchanged and can be used alongside GA outputs.

Running the Optimizer#

Once you have your optimizer configuration and optimizable fields set up, you can run the optimizer from the command line using the nat optimize command.

CLI Command#

nat optimize --config_file <path_to_config>

Options#

  • --config_file: (Required) Path to the JSON or YAML configuration file for your workflow, for example, config.yaml. This file should contain the optimizer section as described above.

  • --dataset: (Optional) Path to a JSON file containing the dataset for evaluation, such as eval_dataset.json. This will override any dataset path specified in the config file. The dataset should be a list of dictionaries, where each dictionary represents a data point and includes the necessary inputs for your workflow and the ground truth for evaluation.

  • --result_json_path: A JSONPath expression to extract the result from the workflow’s output. Defaults to $.

  • --endpoint: If you are running your workflow as a service, you can provide the endpoint URL. For example, http://localhost:8000/generate.

  • --endpoint_timeout: The timeout in seconds for requests to the endpoint. Defaults to 300.

Example:

nat optimize --config_file <path to configuraiton file>

This command will start the optimization process. You will see logs in your terminal showing the progress of the optimization, including the parameters being tested and the scores for each trial.

Understanding the Output#

When the optimizer finishes, it will save the results in the directory specified by the output_path in your OptimizerConfig. This directory will contain several files:

  • optimized_config.yml: Tuned configuration derived from the selected trial.

  • trials_dataframe_params.csv: Full Optuna trials dataframe (values, params, timings, rep_scores).

  • pareto_front_2d.png: 2D Pareto front (when 2 metrics).

  • pareto_parallel_coordinates.png: Parallel coordinates plot.

  • pareto_pairwise_matrix.png: Pairwise metric matrix.

By examining these output files, you can understand the results of the optimization, choose the best parameters for your needs (for example, picking a point on the Pareto front that represents your desired trade-off), and gain insights into your workflow’s behavior.

Understanding the Pareto Visualizations#

The optimizer generates three types of visualizations to help you understand the trade-offs between different objectives:

1. 2D Pareto Front (pareto_front_2d.png)#

Generated only when optimizing exactly 2 metrics, for example in this image

This scatter plot shows:

  • Light blue dots: All trials tested during optimization

  • Red stars: Pareto optimal trials (solutions where improving one metric would worsen another)

  • Red dashed line: The Pareto front connecting optimal solutions

How to interpret:

  • The arrows (↑ or ↓) indicate the direction of improvement for each metric

  • For “maximize” metrics, higher values are better (look up/right)

  • For “minimize” metrics, lower values are better (look down/left)

  • Points on the Pareto front represent different trade-offs - choose based on your priorities

Example: If optimizing accuracy (maximize) vs latency (minimize), the ideal point would be top-left (high accuracy, low latency). The Pareto front shows the best achievable trade-offs.

2. Parallel Coordinates Plot (pareto_parallel_coordinates.png)#

Works with any number of metrics, for example in this image

This plot normalizes all metrics to a 0-1 scale where higher is always better:

  • Blue lines: All trials (shown with low opacity)

  • Red lines: Pareto optimal trials (shown with high opacity)

  • Y-axis: Normalized performance (0 = worst, 1 = best)

  • X-axis: Different metrics with their optimization direction

How to interpret:

  • Each line represents one complete parameter configuration

  • Follow a line across to see how it performs on each metric

  • Parallel lines indicate independent metrics

  • Crossing lines suggest trade-offs between metrics

  • The best solutions have lines staying high across all metrics

Choosing a solution: Look for red lines that maintain good performance (stay high) across the metrics you care most about.

3. Pairwise Matrix Plot (pareto_pairwise_matrix.png)#

Provides detailed metric relationships, for example in this image

This matrix visualization shows:

  • Diagonal cells (histograms): Distribution of values for each individual metric

    • Light blue bars: All trials

    • Red bars: Pareto optimal trials

    • Shows the range and frequency of values achieved

  • Off-diagonal cells (scatter plots): Relationships between pairs of metrics

    • Light blue dots: All trials

    • Red stars: Pareto optimal trials

    • Reveals correlations and trade-offs between metrics

How to interpret:

  • Histograms: Check if Pareto optimal solutions (red) cluster at desirable values

  • Scatter plots: Look for patterns:

    • Positive correlation: Metrics improve together (dots trend up-right)

    • Negative correlation: Trade-off exists (dots trend down-right)

    • No correlation: Metrics are independent (random scatter)

Example interpretation: If the accuracy-latency scatter shows a negative correlation, it confirms that improving accuracy typically increases latency.

Selecting the Best Configuration#

  1. Identify your priorities: Decide which metrics matter most for your use case

  2. Examine the Pareto visualizations: Look for configurations that excel in your priority metrics

  3. Find the trial number: Use the trials_dataframe_params.csv to identify specific trial numbers

  4. Use the configuration: Load the corresponding config_numeric_trial_N.yml file

Example decision process:

  • If latency is critical: Choose a Pareto optimal point with the lowest latency that still meets your accuracy requirements

  • If accuracy is paramount: Select the highest accuracy configuration and accept the latency trade-off

  • For balanced performance: Pick a point in the middle of the Pareto front

A Complete Example of Optimization#

For a complete example of using the optimizer, see the email_phishing_analyzer example in the evaluation_and_profiling section of the examples in the NeMo Agent toolkit repository.

Best Practices and Tuning Guide#

Choosing Optimizer Parameters#

For Numeric Optimization (Optuna)#

Number of Trials (n_trials):

  • Start with 20-50 trials for initial exploration

  • Increase to 100-200 for production optimization

  • More trials = better results but higher cost

  • Use early stopping with target parameter to save time

Repetitions (reps_per_param_set):

  • Use 3-5 reps for deterministic workflows

  • Increase to 10-20 for highly stochastic outputs

  • Higher reps reduce noise but increase cost

For Prompt Optimization (GA)#

Population Size (ga_population_size):

  • Start with 10-20 individuals

  • Larger populations explore more diversity

  • Cost scales linearly with population size

Generations (ga_generations):

  • 5-10 generations often sufficient for convergence

  • Monitor fitness improvement across generations

  • Stop early if fitness plateaus

Mutation vs. Crossover:

  • High mutation rate (0.2-0.3): More exploration, good for initial search

  • High crossover rate (0.7-0.8): More exploitation, good when you have good candidates

  • Balance both for optimal results

Selection Pressure:

  • Tournament size 2-3: Low pressure, maintains diversity

  • Tournament size 5-7: High pressure, faster convergence

  • Elitism 1-2: Preserves best solutions without reducing diversity

Interpreting Optimization Results#

Understanding Pareto Fronts#

The Pareto front visualization shows trade-offs between objectives:

  • Points on the front are optimal (no other point is better in all metrics)

  • Points closer to the top-right are generally better

  • Choose based on your priorities (e.g., accuracy vs. speed)

Reading the Trials DataFrame#

Look for patterns:

  • Which parameters have the most impact?

  • Are certain parameter ranges consistently better?

  • Is there high variance in certain configurations?

Analyzing Parallel Coordinates#

This plot helps identify parameter relationships:

  • Parallel lines indicate independent parameters

  • Crossing lines suggest parameter interactions

  • Color intensity shows performance (darker = better)

Common Pitfalls and Solutions#

Problem: Optimization converges too quickly to suboptimal solutions

  • Solution: Increase population diversity, reduce selection pressure, increase mutation rate

Problem: High variance in evaluation metrics

  • Solution: Increase reps_per_param_set, ensure consistent evaluation conditions

Problem: Optimization is too expensive

  • Solution: Reduce search space, use step for discrete parameters, set target for early stopping

Problem: Prompt optimization produces similar outputs

  • Solution: Increase ga_diversity_lambda, ensure prompt_purpose is specific and actionable

Multi-Objective Optimization Strategies#

Harmonic Mean (default):

  • Balances all objectives

  • Penalizes poor performance in any metric

  • Good for ensuring minimum quality across all metrics

Sum:

  • Simple addition of weighted scores

  • Allows compensation (good in one metric offsets bad in another)

  • Use when total performance matters more than balance

Chebyshev:

  • Minimizes worst-case deviation from ideal

  • Good for risk-averse optimization

  • Ensures no metric is too far from optimal

Workflow-Specific Tips#

For Classification Tasks:

  • Prioritize accuracy or score with high weight (0.7-0.9)

  • Include latency with lower weight (0.1-0.3)

  • Use 5-10 reps to handle class imbalance

For Generation Tasks:

  • Balance quality metrics (coherence, relevance) equally

  • Include diversity metrics to avoid mode collapse

  • Use prompt optimization for style or tone control

For Real-time Applications:

  • Set strict latency targets

  • Use Chebyshev combination to ensure consistency

  • Consider p95 latency instead of mean

Advanced Techniques#

Staged Optimization:

  1. First optimize prompts with small population or generations

  2. Fix best prompts, then optimize numeric parameters

  3. Finally, fine-tune both together

Transfer Learning:

  • Start with parameters from similar optimized workflows

  • Use previous optimization results to set tighter search spaces

  • Reduces optimization time significantly