Update doc for grad_accu and add validation tests for batch size

README.md

@@ -397,6 +397,7 @@ Add below flag to train command above
 Please reduce any below
   - `micro_batch_size`
   - `eval_batch_size`
+  - `gradient_accumulation_steps`
   - `sequence_len`
 
 > RuntimeError: expected scalar type Float but found Half

src/axolotl/utils/validation.py

@@ -8,6 +8,12 @@ def validate_config(cfg):
         raise ValueError(
             "please set only one of gradient_accumulation_steps or batch_size"
         )
+    if cfg.batch_size:
+        logging.warning(
+            "%s\n%s",
+            "batch_size is not recommended. Please use gradient_accumulation_steps instead.",
+            "To calculate the equivalent gradient_accumulation_steps, divide batch_size / micro_batch_size / number of gpus.",
+        )
     if cfg.load_4bit:
         raise ValueError(
             "cfg.load_4bit parameter has been deprecated and replaced by cfg.gptq"

tests/test_validation.py

@@ -1,6 +1,8 @@
 """Module for testing the validation module"""
 
+import logging
 import unittest
+from typing import Optional
 
 import pytest
 
@@ -13,6 +15,12 @@ class ValidationTest(unittest.TestCase):
     Test the validation module
     """
 
+    _caplog: Optional[pytest.LogCaptureFixture] = None
+
+    @pytest.fixture(autouse=True)
+    def inject_fixtures(self, caplog):
+        self._caplog = caplog
+
     def test_load_4bit_deprecate(self):
         cfg = DictDefault(
             {
@@ -23,6 +31,17 @@ class ValidationTest(unittest.TestCase):
         with pytest.raises(ValueError):
             validate_config(cfg)
 
+    def test_batch_size_unused_warning(self):
+        cfg = DictDefault(
+            {
+                "batch_size": 32,
+            }
+        )
+
+        with self._caplog.at_level(logging.WARNING):
+            validate_config(cfg)
+            assert "batch_size is not recommended" in self._caplog.records[0].message
+
     def test_qlora(self):
         base_cfg = DictDefault(
             {