Foojay Podcast #56: Vectors in Java Code, Databases, and LLMs

In this Foojay podcast, we enter the world of mathematics by discussing Vectors and how they are crucial for AI and machine learning. 

As ChatGPT explains: "A Vector is a mathematical structure that holds numerical values. Vectors are fundamental to the field of Artificial Intelligence, as they allow mathematical operations to be performed efficiently and form the basis of many machine learning algorithms."

OK, but... how are these vectors crucial for the whole Artificial Intelligence evolution?

This is the last podcast of season 3, we're taking a summer break, and will be back in September with the release of Java 23 and many more OpenJDK-related topics!

Video

Podcast (Audio Only)

Guests

• Jonathan Ellis
  • https://www.linkedin.com/in/jbellis/ 
  • https://x.com/spyced  
• Alexander Chatzizacharias
  • https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexander-chatzizacharias/  
  • https://x.com/alex90_ch  

Content

00:00 Introduction of the topic and guests
01:57 What is a Vector?

https://github.com/openai/tiktoken
https://arxiv.org/abs/1301.3781
https://towardsdatascience.com/word2vec-research-paper-explained-205cb7eecc30
https://github.com/jbellis/jvector

07:14 Vectors explained as a game

A fun and absurd introduction to Vector Databases: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQGf9hWTqSw

09:44 Understanding tokenizers
10:40 Do we need dedicated Vector databases?
13:39 Vectors, LLMs, and hallucinations

Crafting your own RAG system: Leveraging 30+ LLMs for enhanced performance by Stephan Janssen: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9PX5l4ETn0g

20:40 How LLM and chat interfaces are used in companies

https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20240222-air-canada-chatbot-misinformation-what-travellers-should-know

23:45 Indexing all of Wikipedia

https://foojay.io/today/indexing-all-of-wikipedia-on-a-laptop/
Demo application: https://jvectordemo.com:8443/
https://openjdk.org/projects/panama/

27:23 Evolutions in Java for vectors, LLMs, and AI

Vector API (Eighth Incubator): https://openjdk.org/jeps/469
Foreign Function & Memory API: https://openjdk.org/jeps/454

32:44 Is the GPU needed for vector use cases?
35:04 Can we already use the incubator Vector API in production?
38:27 Some predictions...

Colbert project: https://github.com/stanford-futuredata/ColBERT
https://thenewstack.io/overcoming-the-limits-of-rag-with-colbert/

44:19 Make your vectors smaller to make them more efficient and less expensive

https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/engineering/vector-quantization
https://huggingface.co/blog/embedding-quantization
https://foojay.io/today/visualizing-brain-computer-interface-data-using-javafx/
Asteroids 3D in JavaFX made from AI Deep Fake Audio data: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFThM9BoTLg

49:19 Outro