update tags

* don't cache pip install

* no cache dir for disk space for sdist too

.bandit

@@ -1,3 +1,3 @@
 [bandit]
 exclude = tests
-skips = B101,B615
+skips = B101,B615,B102,B110

.coderabbit.yaml

@@ -12,5 +12,6 @@ reviews:
   auto_review:
     enabled: true
     drafts: false
+    auto_incremental_review: false
 chat:
   auto_reply: true

.coveragerc

@@ -2,7 +2,6 @@
 source = axolotl
 omit =
     */tests/*
-    setup.py
 
 [report]
 exclude_lines =

.flake8

@@ -1,5 +0,0 @@
-[flake8]
-max-line-length = 88
-
-select = C,E,F,W,B,B950
-extend-ignore = E203, E501, W503

.github/CONTRIBUTING.md

@@ -29,13 +29,18 @@ PRs are **greatly welcome**!
 2. Set up the development environment by following the instructions in the [README.md](https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl/tree/main/README.md) file.
 3. Explore the codebase, run tests, and verify that everything works as expected.
 
-Please run below to setup env
-```bash
-pip3 install -r requirements-dev.txt -r requirements-tests.txt
-pre-commit install
+Please run the below to setup:
 
-# test
-pytest tests/
+```bash
+git clone https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl.git
+cd axolotl
+
+uv sync --dev && uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
+source .venv/bin/activate
+
+pre-commit install  # install pre-commit hooks
+
+pytest tests/  # optional; run test suite
 ```
 
 ## How to Contribute

.github/workflows/base.yml

@@ -39,13 +39,6 @@ jobs:
             pytorch: 2.6.0
             torch_cuda_arch_list: "7.0 7.5 8.0 8.6 8.7 8.9 9.0+PTX"
             dockerfile: "Dockerfile-base"
-          - cuda: "126"
-            cuda_version: 12.6.3
-            cudnn_version: ""
-            python_version: "3.11"
-            pytorch: 2.7.0
-            torch_cuda_arch_list: "7.0 7.5 8.0 8.6 8.7 8.9 9.0+PTX"
-            dockerfile: "Dockerfile-base"
           - cuda: "126"
             cuda_version: 12.6.3
             cudnn_version: ""
@@ -105,7 +98,9 @@ jobs:
           context: .
           file: ./docker/${{ matrix.dockerfile }}
           push: ${{ github.event_name != 'pull_request' }}
-          tags: ${{ steps.metadata.outputs.tags }}-base-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}${{ matrix.axolotl_extras != '' && '-' || '' }}${{ matrix.axolotl_extras }}
+          tags: |
+            ${{ steps.metadata.outputs.tags }}-base-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}${{ matrix.axolotl_extras != '' && '-' || '' }}${{ matrix.axolotl_extras }}
+            ${{ steps.metadata.outputs.tags }}-base-uv-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}${{ matrix.axolotl_extras != '' && '-' || '' }}${{ matrix.axolotl_extras }}
           labels: ${{ steps.metadata.outputs.labels }}
           build-args: |
             CUDA_VERSION=${{ matrix.cuda_version }}

.github/workflows/docs.yml

@@ -20,10 +20,14 @@ jobs:
           uses: actions/setup-python@v5
           with:
             python-version: '3.11'
+        - name: Install uv
+          uses: astral-sh/setup-uv@v4
+          with:
+            version: "latest"
         - name: Install dependencies
           run: |
-            python3 -m pip install jupyter quartodoc
-            python3 -m pip install -e .
+            uv pip install --system jupyter quartodoc
+            uv pip install --system -e .
         - name: Build autodoc
           run: quartodoc build
         - name: Publish to GitHub Pages (and render)

.github/workflows/lint.yml

@@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ on:
       types: [opened, synchronize, reopened, ready_for_review]
       paths:
        - '**.py'
-       - 'requirements.txt'
+       - 'pyproject.toml'
        - '.github/workflows/*.yml'
        - "*.[q]md"
        - "examples/**/*.y[a]?ml"
@@ -23,5 +23,4 @@ jobs:
       - uses: actions/setup-python@v5
         with:
           python-version: "3.11"
-          cache: 'pip' # caching pip dependencies
       - uses: pre-commit/action@v3.0.1

.github/workflows/main.yml

@@ -20,11 +20,6 @@ jobs:
             python_version: "3.11"
             pytorch: 2.6.0
             axolotl_extras:
-          - cuda: 126
-            cuda_version: 12.6.3
-            python_version: "3.11"
-            pytorch: 2.7.0
-            axolotl_extras:
           - cuda: 126
             cuda_version: 12.6.3
             python_version: "3.11"
@@ -36,6 +31,11 @@ jobs:
             python_version: "3.11"
             pytorch: 2.7.1
             axolotl_extras:
+          - cuda: 128
+            cuda_version: 12.8.1
+            python_version: "3.11"
+            pytorch: 2.8.0
+            axolotl_extras:
     runs-on: axolotl-gpu-runner
     steps:
       - name: Checkout
@@ -68,6 +68,8 @@ jobs:
             PYTORCH_VERSION=${{ matrix.pytorch }}
             AXOLOTL_ARGS=${{ matrix.axolotl_args }}
             AXOLOTL_EXTRAS=${{ matrix.axolotl_extras}}
+            GIT_REF=${{ github.ref }}
+            GIT_SHA=${{ github.sha }}
           file: ./docker/Dockerfile
           push: ${{ github.event_name != 'pull_request' }}
           tags: |
@@ -88,11 +90,6 @@ jobs:
             python_version: "3.11"
             pytorch: 2.6.0
             axolotl_extras:
-          - cuda: 126
-            cuda_version: 12.6.3
-            python_version: "3.11"
-            pytorch: 2.7.0
-            axolotl_extras:
           - cuda: 126
             cuda_version: 12.6.3
             python_version: "3.11"
@@ -110,6 +107,11 @@ jobs:
             python_version: "3.11"
             pytorch: 2.7.1
             axolotl_extras:
+          - cuda: 128
+            cuda_version: 12.8.1
+            python_version: "3.11"
+            pytorch: 2.8.0
+            axolotl_extras:
     runs-on: axolotl-gpu-runner
     steps:
       - name: Checkout
@@ -138,6 +140,8 @@ jobs:
           build-args: |
             BASE_TAG=${{ github.ref_type == 'tag' && 'main' || github.ref_name }}-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}${{ matrix.axolotl_extras != '' && '-' || '' }}${{ matrix.axolotl_extras }}
             CUDA=${{ matrix.cuda }}
+            GIT_REF=${{ github.ref }}
+            GIT_SHA=${{ github.sha }}
           file: ./docker/Dockerfile-cloud
           push: ${{ github.event_name != 'pull_request' }}
           tags: |
@@ -169,6 +173,12 @@ jobs:
             pytorch: 2.7.1
             axolotl_extras: vllm
             is_latest: true
+          - cuda: 128
+            cuda_version: 12.8.1
+            python_version: "3.11"
+            pytorch: 2.8.0
+            axolotl_extras:
+            is_latest:
     runs-on: axolotl-gpu-runner
     steps:
       - name: Checkout
@@ -197,6 +207,8 @@ jobs:
           build-args: |
             BASE_TAG=${{ github.ref_type == 'tag' && 'main' || github.ref_name }}-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}${{ matrix.axolotl_extras != '' && '-' || '' }}${{ matrix.axolotl_extras }}
             CUDA=${{ matrix.cuda }}
+            GIT_REF=${{ github.ref }}
+            GIT_SHA=${{ github.sha }}
           file: ./docker/Dockerfile-cloud-no-tmux
           push: ${{ github.event_name != 'pull_request' }}
           tags: |

.github/workflows/multi-gpu-e2e.yml

@@ -4,8 +4,6 @@ on:
   pull_request:
     paths:
       - 'tests/e2e/multigpu/**.py'
-      - 'requirements.txt'
-      - 'setup.py'
       - 'pyproject.toml'
       - '.github/workflows/multi-gpu-e2e.yml'
       - 'src/axolotl/core/trainers/mixins/sequence_parallel.py'
@@ -33,13 +31,6 @@ jobs:
             axolotl_extras:
             num_gpus: 2
             nightly_build: "true"
-          - cuda: 126
-            cuda_version: 12.6.3
-            python_version: "3.11"
-            pytorch: 2.7.0
-            axolotl_extras:
-            num_gpus: 2
-            nightly_build: "true"
           - cuda: 126
             cuda_version: 12.6.3
             python_version: "3.11"
@@ -47,6 +38,13 @@ jobs:
             axolotl_extras: vllm
             num_gpus: 2
             nightly_build: "true"
+          - cuda: 128
+            cuda_version: 12.8.1
+            python_version: "3.11"
+            pytorch: 2.8.0
+            axolotl_extras: fbgemm-gpu
+            num_gpus: 2
+            nightly_build: "true"
     runs-on: [self-hosted, modal]
     timeout-minutes: 120
     steps:
@@ -56,13 +54,17 @@ jobs:
         uses: actions/setup-python@v5
         with:
           python-version: "3.11"
+      - name: Install uv
+        uses: astral-sh/setup-uv@v4
+        with:
+          version: "latest"
       - name: Install Modal
         run: |
           python -m pip install --upgrade pip
-          pip install modal==1.0.2 jinja2
+          pip install modal==1.0.2 jinja2 protobuf
       - name: Update env vars
         run: |
-          echo "BASE_TAG=main-base-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
+          echo "BASE_TAG=${{ github.ref_name }}-base-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "PYTORCH_VERSION=${{ matrix.pytorch}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "AXOLOTL_ARGS=${{ matrix.axolotl_args}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "AXOLOTL_EXTRAS=${{ matrix.axolotl_extras}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
@@ -72,4 +74,4 @@ jobs:
           echo "CODECOV_TOKEN=${{ secrets.CODECOV_TOKEN }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
       - name: Run tests job on Modal
         run: |
-          modal run cicd.multigpu
+          modal run -m cicd.multigpu

.github/workflows/nightlies.yml

@@ -52,6 +52,8 @@ jobs:
             CUDA=${{ matrix.cuda }}
             PYTORCH_VERSION=${{ matrix.pytorch }}
             AXOLOTL_ARGS=${{ matrix.axolotl_args }}
+            GIT_REF=${{ github.ref }}
+            GIT_SHA=${{ github.sha }}
           file: ./docker/Dockerfile
           push: ${{ github.event_name != 'pull_request' }}
           tags: |
@@ -102,6 +104,8 @@ jobs:
           build-args: |
             BASE_TAG=${{ github.ref_name }}-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}${{ matrix.axolotl_extras != '' && '-' || '' }}${{ matrix.axolotl_extras }}
             CUDA=${{ matrix.cuda }}
+            GIT_REF=${{ github.ref }}
+            GIT_SHA=${{ github.sha }}
           file: ./docker/Dockerfile-cloud
           push: ${{ github.event_name != 'pull_request' }}
           tags: |

.github/workflows/precommit-autoupdate.yml

@@ -18,10 +18,15 @@ jobs:
         with:
           python-version: '3.11'
 
+      - name: Install uv
+        uses: astral-sh/setup-uv@v4
+        with:
+          version: "latest"
+
       - name: Update pre-commit hooks
         id: update
         run: |
-          pip install pre-commit
+          uv pip install --system pre-commit
           pre-commit autoupdate
           if [[ -n $(git status --porcelain) ]]; then
             echo "changes=true" >> $GITHUB_OUTPUT

.github/workflows/preview-docs.yml

@@ -40,10 +40,15 @@ jobs:
         with:
           python-version: '3.11'
 
+      - name: Install uv
+        uses: astral-sh/setup-uv@v4
+        with:
+          version: "latest"
+
       - name: Install dependencies
         run: |
-          python3 -m pip install jupyter quartodoc
-          python3 -m pip install -e .
+          uv pip install --system jupyter quartodoc
+          uv pip install --system -e .
 
       - name: Build autodoc
         run: quartodoc build

.github/workflows/pypi.yml

@@ -38,23 +38,24 @@ jobs:
         with:
           python-version: "3.11"
 
+      - name: Install uv
+        uses: astral-sh/setup-uv@v4
+        with:
+          version: "latest"
+
       - name: Install dependencies
         run: |
-          pip3 install wheel packaging==23.2
-          pip3 install --no-build-isolation -e .
-          pip3 install -r requirements-dev.txt -r requirements-tests.txt
+          uv pip install --system wheel packaging==23.2
+          uv pip install --system --no-build-isolation -e ".[dev]"
 
       - name: Extract tag name
         id: tag
-        run: echo ::set-output name=TAG_NAME::$(echo $GITHUB_REF | cut -d / -f 3)
+        run: echo "TAG_NAME=$(echo "$GITHUB_REF" | cut -d / -f 3)" >> "$GITHUB_OUTPUT"
 
-      - name: Update version in setup.py
+      - name: Build package
         run: |
-          sed -i -E 's/version="([0-9.]+)",/version="${{ steps.tag.outputs.TAG_NAME }}",/g' setup.py
-
-      - name: Build a source dist
-        run: |
-          python setup.py sdist
+          uv pip install --system build
+          python -m build
 
       - name: Publish package distributions to PyPI
         uses: pypa/gh-action-pypi-publish@release/v1

.github/workflows/tests-nightly.yml

@@ -13,7 +13,6 @@ jobs:
       - uses: actions/setup-python@v5
         with:
           python-version: "3.11"
-          cache: 'pip' # caching pip dependencies
       - uses: pre-commit/action@v3.0.1
         env:
           SKIP: no-commit-to-branch
@@ -43,32 +42,30 @@ jobs:
         uses: actions/setup-python@v5
         with:
           python-version: ${{ matrix.python_version }}
-          cache: 'pip' # caching pip dependencies
 
-      - name: upgrade pip
-        run: |
-          pip3 install --upgrade pip
-          pip3 install --upgrade packaging==23.2 setuptools==75.8.0 wheel
+      - name: Install uv
+        uses: astral-sh/setup-uv@v4
+        with:
+          version: "latest"
 
       - name: Install PyTorch
         run: |
-          pip3 install torch==${{ matrix.pytorch_version }} torchvision
+          uv pip install --system torch==${{ matrix.pytorch_version }} torchvision
 
-      - name: Update requirements.txt
+      - name: Update pyproject.toml for nightly builds
         run: |
-          sed -i 's#^transformers.*#transformers @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/transformers.git@main#' requirements.txt
-          sed -i 's#^peft.*#peft @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/peft.git@main#' requirements.txt
-          sed -i 's#^accelerate.*#accelerate @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/accelerate.git@main#' requirements.txt
-          sed -i 's#^trl.*#trl @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/trl.git@main#' requirements.txt
-          sed -i 's#^datasets.*#datasets @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/datasets.git@main#' requirements.txt
+          sed -i 's#"transformers==.*"#"transformers @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/transformers.git@main"#' pyproject.toml
+          sed -i 's#"peft==.*"#"peft @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/peft.git@main"#' pyproject.toml
+          sed -i 's#"accelerate==.*"#"accelerate @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/accelerate.git@main"#' pyproject.toml
+          sed -i 's#"trl==.*"#"trl @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/trl.git@main"#' pyproject.toml
+          sed -i 's#"datasets==.*"#"datasets @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/datasets.git@main"#' pyproject.toml
 
       - name: Install dependencies
         run: |
-          pip3 show torch
-          pip3 install --no-build-isolation -U -e .
+          uv pip show --system torch
+          uv pip install --system --no-build-isolation -e ".[dev]"
           python scripts/unsloth_install.py | sh
           python scripts/cutcrossentropy_install.py | sh
-          pip3 install -r requirements-dev.txt -r requirements-tests.txt
 
       - name: Make sure PyTorch version wasn't clobbered
         run: |
@@ -84,9 +81,6 @@ jobs:
           pytest -v --durations=10 tests/patched/
           pytest -v --durations=10 tests/cli/
 
-      - name: cleanup pip cache
-        run: |
-          find "$(pip cache dir)/http-v2" -type f -mtime +14 -exec rm {} \;
 
   docker-e2e-tests:
     if: github.repository_owner == 'axolotl-ai-cloud'
@@ -120,13 +114,16 @@ jobs:
         uses: actions/setup-python@v5
         with:
           python-version: "3.11"
+      - name: Install uv
+        uses: astral-sh/setup-uv@v4
+        with:
+          version: "latest"
       - name: Install Modal
         run: |
-          python -m pip install --upgrade pip
-          pip install modal==1.0.2 jinja2
+          uv pip install --system modal==1.0.2 jinja2
       - name: Update env vars
         run: |
-          echo "BASE_TAG=main-base-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
+          echo "BASE_TAG=main-base-uv-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "PYTORCH_VERSION=${{ matrix.pytorch}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "AXOLOTL_ARGS=${{ matrix.axolotl_args}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "AXOLOTL_EXTRAS=${{ matrix.axolotl_extras}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
@@ -136,7 +133,7 @@ jobs:
           echo "CODECOV_TOKEN=${{ secrets.CODECOV_TOKEN }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
       - name: Run tests job on Modal
         run: |
-          modal run cicd.e2e_tests
+          modal run -m cicd.e2e_tests
   docker-e2e-multigpu-tests:
     if: github.repository_owner == 'axolotl-ai-cloud'
     # this job needs to be run on self-hosted GPU runners...
@@ -162,13 +159,16 @@ jobs:
         uses: actions/setup-python@v5
         with:
           python-version: "3.11"
+      - name: Install uv
+        uses: astral-sh/setup-uv@v4
+        with:
+          version: "latest"
       - name: Install Modal
         run: |
-          python -m pip install --upgrade pip
-          pip install modal==1.0.2 jinja2
+          uv pip install --system modal==1.0.2 jinja2
       - name: Update env vars
         run: |
-          echo "BASE_TAG=main-base-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
+          echo "BASE_TAG=main-base-uv-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "PYTORCH_VERSION=${{ matrix.pytorch}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "AXOLOTL_ARGS=${{ matrix.axolotl_args}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "AXOLOTL_EXTRAS=${{ matrix.axolotl_extras}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV

.github/workflows/tests.yml

@@ -7,18 +7,16 @@ on:
       - "main"
     paths:
       - '**.py'
-      - 'requirements.txt'
+      - 'pyproject.toml'
       - '.github/workflows/*.yml'
-      - 'requirements-tests.txt'
       - 'cicd/cicd.sh'
       - 'cicd/Dockerfile.jinja'
   pull_request:
       types: [opened, synchronize, reopened, ready_for_review]
       paths:
        - '**.py'
-       - 'requirements.txt'
+       - 'pyproject.toml'
        - '.github/workflows/*.yml'
-       - 'requirements-tests.txt'
        - 'cicd/cicd.sh'
        - 'cicd/Dockerfile.jinja'
   workflow_dispatch:
@@ -41,7 +39,6 @@ jobs:
       - uses: actions/setup-python@v5
         with:
           python-version: "3.11"
-          cache: 'pip' # caching pip dependencies
       - uses: pre-commit/action@v3.0.1
         env:
           SKIP: no-commit-to-branch
@@ -55,7 +52,7 @@ jobs:
       fail-fast: false
       matrix:
         python_version: ["3.11"]
-        pytorch_version: ["2.6.0", "2.7.0", "2.7.1"]
+        pytorch_version: ["2.6.0", "2.7.1", "2.8.0"]
     timeout-minutes: 20
 
     steps:
@@ -72,24 +69,25 @@ jobs:
         uses: actions/setup-python@v5
         with:
           python-version: ${{ matrix.python_version }}
-          cache: 'pip' # caching pip dependencies
 
-      - name: upgrade pip
-        run: |
-          pip3 install --upgrade pip
-          pip3 install --upgrade packaging==23.2 setuptools==75.8.0 wheel
+      - name: Install uv
+        uses: astral-sh/setup-uv@v4
+        with:
+          version: "latest"
 
       - name: Install PyTorch
         run: |
-          pip3 install torch==${{ matrix.pytorch_version }} torchvision
+          uv pip install --system torch==${{ matrix.pytorch_version }} torchvision
 
       - name: Install dependencies
         run: |
-          pip3 show torch
-          pip3 install --no-build-isolation -U -e .
-          python scripts/unsloth_install.py | sh
-          python scripts/cutcrossentropy_install.py | sh
-          pip3 install -r requirements-dev.txt -r requirements-tests.txt
+          uv pip show --system torch
+          uv pip install --system wheel
+          printf "torch==${{ matrix.pytorch_version }}\n" > torch-constraints.txt
+          uv pip install --system --no-cache-dir --no-build-isolation -e ".[dev]" --constraints torch-constraints.txt
+          set -o pipefail
+          python scripts/unsloth_install.py | bash
+          python scripts/cutcrossentropy_install.py | bash
 
       - name: Make sure PyTorch version wasn't clobbered
         run: |
@@ -105,10 +103,10 @@ jobs:
 
       - name: Run tests
         run: |
-          pytest -v --durations=10 -n8 --dist loadfile --ignore=tests/e2e/ --ignore=tests/patched/ --ignore=tests/cli/ --ignore=tests/monkeypatch/ tests/ --cov=axolotl --cov-report=xml
-          pytest -v --durations=10 tests/monkeypatch/ --cov=axolotl --cov-append --cov-report=xml
-          pytest -v --durations=10 tests/patched/ --cov=axolotl --cov-append --cov-report=xml
-          pytest -v --durations=10 tests/cli/ --cov=axolotl --cov-append --cov-report=xml
+          python -m pytest -v --durations=10 -n 8 --dist loadfile --cov=axolotl --cov-report=xml --ignore=tests/e2e/ --ignore=tests/patched/ --ignore=tests/cli/ --ignore=tests/monkeypatch/ tests/
+          python -m pytest -v --durations=10 -n 8 --cov=axolotl --cov-append --cov-report=xml tests/monkeypatch/
+          python -m pytest -v --durations=10 -n 8 --cov=axolotl --cov-append --cov-report=xml tests/patched/
+          python -m pytest -v --durations=10 -n 8 --cov=axolotl --cov-append --cov-report=xml tests/cli/
 
       - name: Upload coverage to Codecov
         uses: codecov/codecov-action@v5
@@ -118,9 +116,6 @@ jobs:
           flags: unittests,pytorch-${{ matrix.pytorch_version }}
           fail_ci_if_error: false
 
-      - name: cleanup pip cache
-        run: |
-          find "$(pip cache dir)/http-v2" -type f -mtime +14 -exec rm {} \;
 
   pytest-sdist:
     name: PyTest from Source Dist
@@ -130,7 +125,7 @@ jobs:
       fail-fast: false
       matrix:
         python_version: ["3.11"]
-        pytorch_version: ["2.6.0", "2.7.0", "2.7.1"]
+        pytorch_version: ["2.6.0", "2.7.1", "2.8.0"]
     timeout-minutes: 20
 
     steps:
@@ -147,25 +142,26 @@ jobs:
         uses: actions/setup-python@v5
         with:
           python-version: ${{ matrix.python_version }}
-          cache: 'pip' # caching pip dependencies
 
-      - name: upgrade pip
-        run: |
-          pip3 install --upgrade pip
-          pip3 install --upgrade packaging==23.2 setuptools==75.8.0 setuptools_scm build wheel
+      - name: Install uv
+        uses: astral-sh/setup-uv@v4
+        with:
+          version: "latest"
 
       - name: Install PyTorch
         run: |
-          pip3 install torch==${{ matrix.pytorch_version }} torchvision
+          uv pip install --system torch==${{ matrix.pytorch_version }} torchvision
 
       - name: Install dependencies
         run: |
-          pip3 show torch
-          python -m build --no-isolation --sdist
-          pip3 install --no-build-isolation dist/axolotl*.tar.gz
+          uv pip show --system torch
+          uv pip install --system wheel build setuptools_scm
+          python -m build --sdist
+          printf "torch==${{ matrix.pytorch_version }}\n" > torch-constraints.txt
+          tarball_path=$(echo dist/axolotl*.tar.gz)
+          uv pip install --no-cache-dir --no-build-isolation --system "${tarball_path}[dev]" --constraints torch-constraints.txt
           python scripts/unsloth_install.py | sh
           python scripts/cutcrossentropy_install.py | sh
-          pip3 install -r requirements-dev.txt -r requirements-tests.txt
 
       - name: Make sure PyTorch version wasn't clobbered
         run: |
@@ -180,13 +176,9 @@ jobs:
 
       - name: Run tests
         run: |
-          pytest -v --durations=10 -n8 --dist loadfile --ignore=tests/e2e/ --ignore=tests/patched/ --ignore=tests/cli/ --ignore=tests/monkeypatch/ tests/ --cov=axolotl --cov-report=xml
-          pytest -v --durations=10 tests/monkeypatch/ --cov=axolotl --cov-append --cov-report=xml
-          pytest -v --durations=10 tests/cli/
-
-      - name: cleanup pip cache
-        run: |
-          find "$(pip cache dir)/http-v2" -type f -mtime +14 -exec rm {} \;
+          python -m pytest -v --durations=10 -n 8 --dist loadfile --cov=axolotl --cov-report=xml --ignore=tests/e2e/ --ignore=tests/patched/ --ignore=tests/cli/ --ignore=tests/monkeypatch/ tests/
+          python -m pytest -v --durations=10 -n 8 --cov=axolotl --cov-append --cov-report=xml tests/monkeypatch/
+          python -m pytest -v --durations=10 -n 8 tests/cli/
 
   gate-skip-e2e:
     needs: [pre-commit, pytest, pytest-sdist]
@@ -240,10 +232,10 @@ jobs:
           - cuda: 126
             cuda_version: 12.6.3
             python_version: "3.11"
-            pytorch: 2.6.0
+            pytorch: 2.7.1
             num_gpus: 1
             axolotl_extras:
-            dockerfile: "Dockerfile-uv.jinja"
+            dockerfile: "Dockerfile.jinja"
     steps:
       - name: Checkout
         uses: actions/checkout@v4
@@ -251,13 +243,17 @@ jobs:
         uses: actions/setup-python@v5
         with:
           python-version: "3.11"
+      - name: Install uv
+        uses: astral-sh/setup-uv@v4
+        with:
+          version: "latest"
       - name: Install Modal
         run: |
           python -m pip install --upgrade pip
-          pip install modal==1.0.2 jinja2
+          pip install modal==1.0.2 jinja2 protobuf
       - name: Update env vars
         run: |
-          echo "BASE_TAG=main-base-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
+          echo "BASE_TAG=${{ github.ref_name }}-base-uv-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "PYTORCH_VERSION=${{ matrix.pytorch}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "AXOLOTL_ARGS=${{ matrix.axolotl_args}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "AXOLOTL_EXTRAS=${{ matrix.axolotl_extras}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
@@ -298,6 +294,13 @@ jobs:
             pytorch: 2.7.1
             num_gpus: 1
             axolotl_extras:
+          - cuda: 128
+            cuda_version: 12.8.1
+            python_version: "3.11"
+            pytorch: 2.8.0
+            num_gpus: 1
+            gpu_type: "B200"
+            axolotl_extras: fbgemm-gpu
     steps:
       - name: Checkout
         uses: actions/checkout@v4
@@ -305,19 +308,24 @@ jobs:
         uses: actions/setup-python@v5
         with:
           python-version: "3.11"
+      - name: Install uv
+        uses: astral-sh/setup-uv@v4
+        with:
+          version: "latest"
       - name: Install Modal
         run: |
           python -m pip install --upgrade pip
-          pip install modal==1.0.2 jinja2
+          pip install modal==1.0.2 jinja2 protobuf
       - name: Update env vars
         run: |
-          echo "BASE_TAG=main-base-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
+          echo "BASE_TAG=${{ github.ref_name }}-base-uv-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "PYTORCH_VERSION=${{ matrix.pytorch}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "AXOLOTL_ARGS=${{ matrix.axolotl_args}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "AXOLOTL_EXTRAS=${{ matrix.axolotl_extras}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "CUDA=${{ matrix.cuda }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "MODAL_IMAGE_BUILDER_VERSION=2024.10" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "N_GPUS=${{ matrix.num_gpus }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
+          echo "GPU_TYPE=${{ matrix.gpu_type || 'L40S'}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "CODECOV_TOKEN=${{ secrets.CODECOV_TOKEN }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "E2E_DOCKERFILE=${{ matrix.dockerfile || 'Dockerfile.jinja'}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
       - name: Run tests job on Modal
@@ -334,10 +342,10 @@ jobs:
       fail-fast: false
       matrix:
         include:
-          - cuda: 124
-            cuda_version: 12.4.1
+          - cuda: 126
+            cuda_version: 12.6.3
             python_version: "3.11"
-            pytorch: 2.6.0
+            pytorch: 2.7.1
             num_gpus: 1
             axolotl_extras:
     steps:
@@ -347,13 +355,17 @@ jobs:
         uses: actions/setup-python@v5
         with:
           python-version: "3.11"
+      - name: Install uv
+        uses: astral-sh/setup-uv@v4
+        with:
+          version: "latest"
       - name: Install Modal
         run: |
           python -m pip install --upgrade pip
-          pip install modal==1.0.2 jinja2
+          pip install modal==1.0.2 jinja2 protobuf
       - name: Update env vars
         run: |
-          echo "BASE_TAG=main-base-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
+          echo "BASE_TAG=${{ github.ref_name }}-base-uv-py${{ matrix.python_version }}-cu${{ matrix.cuda }}-${{ matrix.pytorch }}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "PYTORCH_VERSION=${{ matrix.pytorch}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "AXOLOTL_ARGS=${{ matrix.axolotl_args}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
           echo "AXOLOTL_EXTRAS=${{ matrix.axolotl_extras}}" >> $GITHUB_ENV

.gitignore

@@ -190,3 +190,6 @@ out/
 
 # vim
 *.swp
+
+# setuptools-scm generated version file
+src/axolotl/_version.py

.isort.cfg

@@ -1,4 +0,0 @@
-[settings]
-profile=black
-known_third_party=wandb,comet_ml
-known_local_folder=src,tests

.pre-commit-config.yaml

@@ -10,22 +10,12 @@ repos:
     -   id: trailing-whitespace
     -   id: no-commit-to-branch
         args: ['--branch', 'main']
--   repo: https://github.com/psf/black
-    rev: 25.1.0
+-   repo: https://github.com/astral-sh/ruff-pre-commit
+    rev: v0.12.12
     hooks:
-    -   id: black
--   repo: https://github.com/pycqa/isort
-    rev: 6.0.1
-    hooks:
-      - id: isort
--   repo: https://github.com/PyCQA/flake8
-    rev: 7.3.0
-    hooks:
-    - id: flake8
--   repo: https://github.com/pylint-dev/pylint
-    rev: v3.3.8
-    hooks:
-    - id: pylint
+    -   id: ruff
+        args: [--fix]
+    -   id: ruff-format
 -   repo: https://github.com/pre-commit/mirrors-mypy
     rev: v1.17.1
     hooks:

.pylintrc

@@ -1,15 +0,0 @@
-[MASTER]
-init-hook="from pylint.config import find_default_config_files; import sys; sys.path.append(next(find_default_config_files()).parent.as_posix())"
-
-[TYPECHECK]
-
-# List of members which are set dynamically and missed by Pylint inference
-# system, and so shouldn't trigger E1101 when accessed.
-generated-members=numpy.*, torch.*
-
-
-[pylint.messages_control]
-disable=missing-function-docstring, line-too-long, import-error,
-    too-many-arguments, too-many-locals, too-many-statements, too-many-branches, too-few-public-methods,
-    too-many-instance-attributes, fixme, import-outside-toplevel, logging-fstring-interpolation,
-    too-many-positional-arguments, possibly-used-before-assignment

.runpod/Dockerfile

@@ -1,9 +1,8 @@
 FROM axolotlai/axolotl-cloud:main-py3.11-cu124-2.6.0
 
 COPY .runpod/requirements.txt /requirements.txt
-RUN --mount=type=cache,target=/root/.cache/pip \
-    python3 -m pip install --upgrade pip && \
-    python3 -m pip install --upgrade -r /requirements.txt
+RUN curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh && \
+    /root/.local/bin/uv pip install --system -r /requirements.txt
 
 # Environment settings
 ARG BASE_VOLUME="/runpod-volume"

CITATION.cff

@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 cff-version: 1.2.0
 type: software
-title: "Axolotl: Post-Training for AI Models"
+title: "Axolotl: Open Source LLM Post-Training"
 message: "If you use this software, please cite it as below."
 authors:
   - name: "Axolotl maintainers and contributors"

MANIFEST.in

@@ -1,6 +1,5 @@
-include requirements.txt
+include pyproject.toml
 include README.md
 include LICENSE
-include src/setuptools_axolotl_dynamic_dependencies.py
 include src/axolotl/utils/chat_templates/templates/*.jinja
-recursive-include axolotl *.py
+recursive-include src/axolotl *.py

README.md

@@ -5,6 +5,9 @@
         <img alt="Axolotl" src="https://raw.githubusercontent.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl/887513285d98132142bf5db2a74eb5e0928787f1/image/axolotl_logo_digital_black.svg" width="400" height="104" style="max-width: 100%;">
     </picture>
 </p>
+  <p align="center">
+      <strong>A Free and Open Source LLM Fine-tuning Framework</strong><br>
+  </p>
 
 <p align="center">
     <img src="https://img.shields.io/github/license/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl.svg?color=blue" alt="GitHub License">
@@ -17,6 +20,7 @@
     <br/>
     <a href="https://discord.com/invite/HhrNrHJPRb"><img src="https://img.shields.io/badge/discord-7289da.svg?style=flat-square&logo=discord" alt="discord" style="height: 20px;"></a>
     <a href="https://twitter.com/axolotl_ai"><img src="https://img.shields.io/twitter/follow/axolotl_ai?style=social" alt="twitter" style="height: 20px;"></a>
+    <a href="https://colab.research.google.com/github/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl/blob/main/examples/colab-notebooks/colab-axolotl-example.ipynb"><img src="https://colab.research.google.com/assets/colab-badge.svg" alt="google-colab" style="height: 20px;"></a>
     <br/>
     <img src="https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl/actions/workflows/tests-nightly.yml/badge.svg" alt="tests-nightly">
     <img src="https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl/actions/workflows/multi-gpu-e2e.yml/badge.svg" alt="multigpu-semi-weekly tests">
@@ -49,38 +53,57 @@
 
 ## ✨ Overview
 
-Axolotl is a tool designed to streamline post-training for various AI models.
+Axolotl is a free and open-source tool designed to streamline post-training and fine-tuning for the latest large language models (LLMs).
 
 Features:
 
-- **Multiple Model Support**: Train various models like LLaMA, Mistral, Mixtral, Pythia, and more. We are compatible with HuggingFace transformers causal language models.
-- **Training Methods**: Full fine-tuning, LoRA, QLoRA, GPTQ, QAT, Preference Tuning (DPO, IPO, KTO, ORPO), RL (GRPO), Multimodal, and Reward Modelling (RM) / Process Reward Modelling (PRM).
-- **Easy Configuration**: Re-use a single YAML file between dataset preprocess, training, evaluation, quantization, and inference.
+- **Multiple Model Support**: Train various models like GPT-OSS, LLaMA, Mistral, Mixtral, Pythia, and many more models available on the Hugging Face Hub.
+- **Multimodal Training**: Fine-tune vision-language models (VLMs) including LLaMA-Vision, Qwen2-VL, Pixtral, LLaVA, SmolVLM2, and audio models like Voxtral with image, video, and audio support.
+- **Training Methods**: Full fine-tuning, LoRA, QLoRA, GPTQ, QAT, Preference Tuning (DPO, IPO, KTO, ORPO), RL (GRPO), and Reward Modelling (RM) / Process Reward Modelling (PRM).
+- **Easy Configuration**: Re-use a single YAML configuration file across the full fine-tuning pipeline: dataset preprocessing, training, evaluation, quantization, and inference.
 - **Performance Optimizations**: [Multipacking](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/multipack.html), [Flash Attention](https://github.com/Dao-AILab/flash-attention), [Xformers](https://github.com/facebookresearch/xformers), [Flex Attention](https://pytorch.org/blog/flexattention/), [Liger Kernel](https://github.com/linkedin/Liger-Kernel), [Cut Cross Entropy](https://github.com/apple/ml-cross-entropy/tree/main), [Sequence Parallelism (SP)](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/sequence_parallelism.html), [LoRA optimizations](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/lora_optims.html), [Multi-GPU training (FSDP1, FSDP2, DeepSpeed)](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/multi-gpu.html), [Multi-node training (Torchrun, Ray)](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/multi-node.html), and many more!
 - **Flexible Dataset Handling**: Load from local, HuggingFace, and cloud (S3, Azure, GCP, OCI) datasets.
 - **Cloud Ready**: We ship [Docker images](https://hub.docker.com/u/axolotlai) and also [PyPI packages](https://pypi.org/project/axolotl/) for use on cloud platforms and local hardware.
 
+## 🚀 Quick Start - LLM Fine-tuning in Minutes
 
+**Requirements**: NVIDIA GPU (Ampere+) or AMD GPU, Python 3.11+
 
-## 🚀 Quick Start
+### Google Colab
 
-**Requirements**:
-
-- NVIDIA GPU (Ampere or newer for `bf16` and Flash Attention) or AMD GPU
-- Python 3.11
-- PyTorch ≥2.6.0
+[![Open In Colab](https://colab.research.google.com/assets/colab-badge.svg)](https://colab.research.google.com/github/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl/blob/main/examples/colab-notebooks/colab-axolotl-example.ipynb#scrollTo=msOCO4NRmRLa)
 
 ### Installation
 
-#### Using pip
+#### Project setup (uv add)
 
 ```bash
-pip3 install -U packaging==23.2 setuptools==75.8.0 wheel ninja
-pip3 install --no-build-isolation axolotl[flash-attn,deepspeed]
+# Install uv
+curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh
+
+# Initialize or enter your project
+uv init my-project && cd my-project
+uv add axolotl
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
+source .venv/bin/activate
 
 # Download example axolotl configs, deepspeed configs
 axolotl fetch examples
-axolotl fetch deepspeed_configs  # OPTIONAL
+axolotl fetch deepspeed_configs  # optional
+```
+
+#### Quick try (uv pip)
+
+```bash
+# Install uv if needed
+curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh
+
+uv pip install axolotl
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
+
+# Download example axolotl configs, deepspeed configs
+axolotl fetch examples
+axolotl fetch deepspeed_configs  # optional
 ```
 
 #### Using Docker
@@ -155,7 +178,7 @@ If you use Axolotl in your research or projects, please cite it as follows:
 
 ```bibtex
 @software{axolotl,
-  title = {Axolotl: Post-Training for AI Models},
+  title = {Axolotl: Open Source LLM Post-Training},
   author = {{Axolotl maintainers and contributors}},
   url = {https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl},
   license = {Apache-2.0},

_quarto.yml

@@ -153,7 +153,7 @@ quartodoc:
         - utils.distributed
         - utils.dict
         - utils.optimizers.adopt
-        - utils.data.pretraining
+        - utils.data.streaming
         - utils.data.sft
         - utils.quantization
     - title: Schemas
@@ -267,11 +267,13 @@ website:
             - docs/dataset_loading.qmd
             - docs/qat.qmd
             - docs/quantize.qmd
+            - docs/optimizations.qmd
 
         - section: "Core Concepts"
           contents:
             - docs/batch_vs_grad.qmd
             - docs/dataset_preprocessing.qmd
+            - docs/streaming.qmd
             - docs/multipack.qmd
             - docs/mixed_precision.qmd
             - docs/optimizers.qmd

cicd/Dockerfile-uv.jinja

@@ -1,52 +0,0 @@
-FROM axolotlai/axolotl-base-uv:{{ BASE_TAG }}
-
-ENV TORCH_CUDA_ARCH_LIST="7.0 7.5 8.0 8.6 9.0+PTX"
-ENV AXOLOTL_EXTRAS="{{ AXOLOTL_EXTRAS }}"
-ENV AXOLOTL_ARGS="{{ AXOLOTL_ARGS }}"
-ENV CUDA="{{ CUDA }}"
-ENV PYTORCH_VERSION="{{ PYTORCH_VERSION }}"
-ENV GITHUB_REF="{{ GITHUB_REF }}"
-ENV GITHUB_SHA="{{ GITHUB_SHA }}"
-ENV NIGHTLY_BUILD="{{ NIGHTLY_BUILD }}"
-ENV HF_HOME="{{ HF_HOME }}"
-
-RUN apt-get update && \
-    apt-get install -y --allow-change-held-packages vim curl nano libnccl2 libnccl-dev ibverbs-providers ibverbs-utils infiniband-diags librdmacm-dev librdmacm1 rdmacm-utils slurm-wlm
-
-WORKDIR /workspace
-
-RUN git clone --depth=1 https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl.git
-
-WORKDIR /workspace/axolotl
-
-RUN git fetch origin +$GITHUB_REF && \
-    git checkout FETCH_HEAD
-
-# If AXOLOTL_EXTRAS is set, append it in brackets
-RUN if [ "$NIGHTLY_BUILD" = "true" ] ; then \
-        sed -i 's#^transformers.*#transformers @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/transformers.git@main#' requirements.txt; \
-        sed -i 's#^peft.*#peft @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/peft.git@main#' requirements.txt; \
-        sed -i 's#^accelerate.*#accelerate @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/accelerate.git@main#' requirements.txt; \
-        sed -i 's#^trl.*#trl @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/trl.git@main#' requirements.txt; \
-        sed -i 's#^datasets.*#datasets @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/datasets.git@main#' requirements.txt; \
-    fi
-
-RUN uv pip install packaging==23.2 setuptools==75.8.0
-RUN if [ "$AXOLOTL_EXTRAS" != "" ] ; then \
-        uv pip install --no-build-isolation -e .[deepspeed,flash-attn,ring-flash-attn,optimizers,ray,$AXOLOTL_EXTRAS] $AXOLOTL_ARGS; \
-    else \
-        uv pip install --no-build-isolation -e .[deepspeed,flash-attn,ring-flash-attn,optimizers,ray] $AXOLOTL_ARGS; \
-    fi
-
-RUN python scripts/unsloth_install.py --uv | sh
-RUN python scripts/cutcrossentropy_install.py --uv | sh
-
-# So we can test the Docker image
-RUN uv pip install -r requirements-dev.txt -r requirements-tests.txt
-
-# fix so that git fetch/pull from remote works
-RUN git config remote.origin.fetch "+refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*" && \
-    git config --get remote.origin.fetch
-
-# helper for huggingface-login cli
-RUN git config --global credential.helper store

cicd/Dockerfile.jinja

@@ -1,6 +1,10 @@
-FROM axolotlai/axolotl-base:{{ BASE_TAG }}
+FROM axolotlai/axolotl-base-uv:{{ BASE_TAG }}
 
-ENV TORCH_CUDA_ARCH_LIST="7.0 7.5 8.0 8.6+PTX"
+SHELL ["/bin/bash", "-euxo", "pipefail", "-c"]
+
+ARG VENV_PYTHON="/workspace/axolotl-venv/bin/python"
+
+ENV TORCH_CUDA_ARCH_LIST="7.0 7.5 8.0 8.6 9.0+PTX"
 ENV AXOLOTL_EXTRAS="{{ AXOLOTL_EXTRAS }}"
 ENV AXOLOTL_ARGS="{{ AXOLOTL_ARGS }}"
 ENV CUDA="{{ CUDA }}"
@@ -9,7 +13,7 @@ ENV GITHUB_REF="{{ GITHUB_REF }}"
 ENV GITHUB_SHA="{{ GITHUB_SHA }}"
 ENV NIGHTLY_BUILD="{{ NIGHTLY_BUILD }}"
 ENV HF_HOME="{{ HF_HOME }}"
-ENV AXOLOTL_DATASET_PROCESSES="8"
+ENV VENV_PYTHON=$VENV_PYTHON
 
 RUN apt-get update && \
     apt-get install -y --allow-change-held-packages vim curl nano libnccl2 libnccl-dev ibverbs-providers ibverbs-utils infiniband-diags librdmacm-dev librdmacm1 rdmacm-utils slurm-wlm
@@ -25,25 +29,27 @@ RUN git fetch origin +$GITHUB_REF && \
 
 # If AXOLOTL_EXTRAS is set, append it in brackets
 RUN if [ "$NIGHTLY_BUILD" = "true" ] ; then \
-        sed -i 's#^transformers.*#transformers @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/transformers.git@main#' requirements.txt; \
-        sed -i 's#^peft.*#peft @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/peft.git@main#' requirements.txt; \
-        sed -i 's#^accelerate.*#accelerate @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/accelerate.git@main#' requirements.txt; \
-        sed -i 's#^trl.*#trl @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/trl.git@main#' requirements.txt; \
-        sed -i 's#^datasets.*#datasets @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/datasets.git@main#' requirements.txt; \
+        sed -i 's#"transformers[^"]*"#"transformers @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/transformers.git@main"#' pyproject.toml; \
+        sed -i 's#"peft[^"]*"#"peft @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/peft.git@main"#' pyproject.toml; \
+        sed -i 's#"accelerate[^"]*"#"accelerate @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/accelerate.git@main"#' pyproject.toml; \
+        sed -i 's#"trl[^"]*"#"trl @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/trl.git@main"#' pyproject.toml; \
+        sed -i 's#"datasets[^"]*"#"datasets @ git+https://github.com/huggingface/datasets.git@main"#' pyproject.toml; \
     fi
 
-RUN pip install packaging==23.2 setuptools==75.8.0
+RUN uv pip install --python "$VENV_PYTHON" packaging==23.2 setuptools==75.8.0 pip
 RUN if [ "$AXOLOTL_EXTRAS" != "" ] ; then \
-        pip install --no-build-isolation -e .[deepspeed,flash-attn,ring-flash-attn,optimizers,ray,$AXOLOTL_EXTRAS] $AXOLOTL_ARGS; \
+        uv pip install --python "$VENV_PYTHON" --no-build-isolation -e .[ring-flash-attn,optimizers,ray,${AXOLOTL_EXTRAS}] $AXOLOTL_ARGS; \
     else \
-        pip install --no-build-isolation -e .[deepspeed,flash-attn,ring-flash-attn,optimizers,ray] $AXOLOTL_ARGS; \
+        uv pip install --python "$VENV_PYTHON" --no-build-isolation -e .[ring-flash-attn,optimizers,ray] $AXOLOTL_ARGS; \
     fi
 
-RUN python scripts/unsloth_install.py | sh
-RUN python scripts/cutcrossentropy_install.py | sh
+RUN uv pip install --python "$VENV_PYTHON" --no-build-isolation flash-attn $AXOLOTL_ARGS
+
+RUN "$VENV_PYTHON" scripts/unsloth_install.py | sh
+RUN "$VENV_PYTHON" scripts/cutcrossentropy_install.py | sh
 
 # So we can test the Docker image
-RUN pip install -r requirements-dev.txt -r requirements-tests.txt
+RUN uv pip install --python "$VENV_PYTHON" -e ".[dev]"
 
 # fix so that git fetch/pull from remote works
 RUN git config remote.origin.fetch "+refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*" && \

cicd/cicd.sh

@@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ set -e
 python -c "import torch; assert '$PYTORCH_VERSION' in torch.__version__"
 
 # Run unit tests with initial coverage report
-pytest -v --durations=10 -n8 \
+uv run pytest -v --durations=10 -n8 \
   --ignore=tests/e2e/ \
   --ignore=tests/patched/ \
   --ignore=tests/cli \
@@ -12,36 +12,36 @@ pytest -v --durations=10 -n8 \
   --cov=axolotl
 
 # Run lora kernels tests with coverage append
-pytest -v --durations=10 \
+uv run pytest -v --durations=10 \
   /workspace/axolotl/tests/e2e/patched/lora_kernels \
   --cov=axolotl \
   --cov-append
 
 # Run patched tests excluding lora kernels with coverage append
-pytest --full-trace -vvv --durations=10 \
+uv run pytest --full-trace -vvv --durations=10 \
   --ignore=tests/e2e/patched/lora_kernels \
   /workspace/axolotl/tests/e2e/patched \
   --cov=axolotl \
   --cov-append
 
 # Run solo tests with coverage append
-pytest -v --durations=10 -n1 \
+uv run pytest -v --durations=10 -n1 \
   /workspace/axolotl/tests/e2e/solo/ \
   --cov=axolotl \
   --cov-append
 
 # Run integration tests with coverage append
-pytest -v --durations=10 \
+uv run pytest -v --durations=10 \
   /workspace/axolotl/tests/e2e/integrations/ \
   --cov=axolotl \
   --cov-append
 
-pytest -v --durations=10 /workspace/axolotl/tests/cli \
+uv run pytest -v --durations=10 /workspace/axolotl/tests/cli \
   --cov=axolotl \
   --cov-append
 
 # Run remaining e2e tests with coverage append and final report
-pytest -v --durations=10 \
+uv run pytest -v --durations=10 \
   --ignore=tests/e2e/solo/ \
   --ignore=tests/e2e/patched/ \
   --ignore=tests/e2e/multigpu/ \
@@ -52,4 +52,4 @@ pytest -v --durations=10 \
   --cov-append \
   --cov-report=xml:e2e-coverage.xml
 
-codecov upload-process -t $CODECOV_TOKEN -f e2e-coverage.xml -F e2e,pytorch-${PYTORCH_VERSION} || true
+uv run codecov upload-process -t $CODECOV_TOKEN -f e2e-coverage.xml -F e2e,pytorch-${PYTORCH_VERSION} || true

cicd/multigpu.py

@@ -2,8 +2,6 @@
 modal application to run axolotl gpu tests in Modal
 """
 
-# pylint: disable=duplicate-code
-
 import os
 import pathlib
 import tempfile
@@ -25,7 +23,7 @@ df_args = {
     "AXOLOTL_EXTRAS": os.environ.get("AXOLOTL_EXTRAS", ""),
     "AXOLOTL_ARGS": os.environ.get("AXOLOTL_ARGS", ""),
     "PYTORCH_VERSION": os.environ.get("PYTORCH_VERSION", "2.6.0"),
-    "BASE_TAG": os.environ.get("BASE_TAG", "main-base-py3.11-cu126-2.6.0"),
+    "BASE_TAG": os.environ.get("BASE_TAG", "main-base-uv-py3.11-cu126-2.6.0"),
     "CUDA": os.environ.get("CUDA", "126"),
     "GITHUB_REF": os.environ.get("GITHUB_REF", "refs/heads/main"),
     "GITHUB_SHA": os.environ.get("GITHUB_SHA", ""),
@@ -63,7 +61,7 @@ def run_cmd(cmd: str, run_folder: str):
 
     # Propagate errors from subprocess.
     if exit_code := subprocess.call(cmd.split(), cwd=run_folder):  # nosec
-        exit(exit_code)  # pylint: disable=consider-using-sys-exit
+        exit(exit_code)
 
 
 @app.function(

cicd/single_gpu.py

@@ -1,7 +1,5 @@
 """Modal app to run axolotl GPU tests"""
 
-# pylint: disable=duplicate-code
-
 import os
 import pathlib
 import tempfile
@@ -25,7 +23,7 @@ df_args = {
     "AXOLOTL_EXTRAS": os.environ.get("AXOLOTL_EXTRAS", ""),
     "AXOLOTL_ARGS": os.environ.get("AXOLOTL_ARGS", ""),
     "PYTORCH_VERSION": os.environ.get("PYTORCH_VERSION", "2.6.0"),
-    "BASE_TAG": os.environ.get("BASE_TAG", "main-base-py3.11-cu126-2.6.0"),
+    "BASE_TAG": os.environ.get("BASE_TAG", "main-base-uv-py3.11-cu126-2.6.0"),
     "CUDA": os.environ.get("CUDA", "126"),
     "GITHUB_REF": os.environ.get("GITHUB_REF", "refs/heads/main"),
     "GITHUB_SHA": os.environ.get("GITHUB_SHA", ""),
@@ -59,7 +57,8 @@ VOLUME_CONFIG = {
 }
 
 N_GPUS = int(os.environ.get("N_GPUS", 1))
-GPU_CONFIG = f"L40S:{N_GPUS}"
+GPU_TYPE = os.environ.get("GPU_TYPE", "L40S")
+GPU_CONFIG = f"{GPU_TYPE}:{N_GPUS}"
 
 
 def run_cmd(cmd: str, run_folder: str):
@@ -70,4 +69,4 @@ def run_cmd(cmd: str, run_folder: str):
 
     # Propagate errors from subprocess.
     if exit_code := subprocess.call(cmd.split(), cwd=run_folder, env=sp_env):  # nosec
-        exit(exit_code)  # pylint: disable=consider-using-sys-exit
+        exit(exit_code)

codecov.yml

@@ -12,7 +12,7 @@ coverage:
       default:
         # basic
         target: auto
-        threshold: 0%
+        threshold: 1%
         base: auto
         # advanced
         branches: null
@@ -27,7 +27,7 @@ coverage:
       default:
         # basic
         target: auto
-        threshold: 0%
+        threshold: 1%
         base: auto
         # advanced
         branches: null

docker/Dockerfile

@@ -1,13 +1,19 @@
-ARG BASE_TAG=main-base
-FROM axolotlai/axolotl-base:$BASE_TAG
+ARG BASE_TAG=main-base-uv
+FROM axolotlai/axolotl-base-uv:$BASE_TAG
 
 ARG TORCH_CUDA_ARCH_LIST="7.0 7.5 8.0 8.6+PTX"
 ARG AXOLOTL_EXTRAS=""
 ARG AXOLOTL_ARGS=""
 ARG CUDA="118"
 ARG PYTORCH_VERSION="2.1.2"
+ARG GIT_REF="refs/heads/main"
+ARG GIT_SHA="HEAD"
+ARG VENV_PYTHON="/workspace/axolotl-venv/bin/python"
 
 ENV PYTORCH_VERSION=$PYTORCH_VERSION
+ENV GIT_REF=$GIT_REF
+ENV GIT_SHA=$GIT_SHA
+ENV VENV_PYTHON=$VENV_PYTHON
 
 RUN apt-get update && \
     apt-get install -y --allow-change-held-packages vim curl nano libnccl2 libnccl-dev rsync s3fs && \
@@ -20,16 +26,19 @@ RUN git clone --depth=1 https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl.git
 
 WORKDIR /workspace/axolotl
 
+# Ensure we are on the expected commit and break Docker cache between revisions
+RUN git fetch origin "$GIT_REF" && git checkout "$GIT_SHA"
+
 # If AXOLOTL_EXTRAS is set, append it in brackets
 RUN if [ "$AXOLOTL_EXTRAS" != "" ] ; then \
-        pip install --no-build-isolation -e .[deepspeed,flash-attn,ring-flash-attn,optimizers,ray,$AXOLOTL_EXTRAS] $AXOLOTL_ARGS; \
+        uv pip install --python "$VENV_PYTHON" --no-build-isolation -e .[ring-flash-attn,optimizers,ray,$AXOLOTL_EXTRAS] $AXOLOTL_ARGS; \
     else \
-        pip install --no-build-isolation -e .[deepspeed,flash-attn,ring-flash-attn,optimizers,ray] $AXOLOTL_ARGS; \
+        uv pip install --python "$VENV_PYTHON" --no-build-isolation -e .[ring-flash-attn,optimizers,ray] $AXOLOTL_ARGS; \
     fi && \
-    python scripts/unsloth_install.py | sh && \
-    python scripts/cutcrossentropy_install.py | sh && \
-    pip install pytest && \
-    pip cache purge
+    uv pip install --python "$VENV_PYTHON" --no-build-isolation flash-attn $AXOLOTL_ARGS && \
+    "$VENV_PYTHON" scripts/unsloth_install.py | sh && \
+    "$VENV_PYTHON" scripts/cutcrossentropy_install.py | sh && \
+    uv pip install --python "$VENV_PYTHON" pytest
 
 # fix so that git fetch/pull from remote works with shallow clone
 RUN git config remote.origin.fetch "+refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*" && \

docker/Dockerfile-base

@@ -48,5 +48,5 @@ RUN git lfs install --skip-repo && \
     pip3 cache purge
 
 RUN if [ "$PYTORCH_VERSION" = "2.6.0" ] && [ "$CUDA" = "124" ] ; then \
-        FLASH_ATTENTION_FORCE_BUILD="TRUE" pip3 install --no-build-isolation flash-attn==2.8.0.post2; \
+        FLASH_ATTENTION_FORCE_BUILD="TRUE" uv pip install --no-build-isolation flash-attn==2.8.0.post2; \
     fi

docker/Dockerfile-cloud

@@ -12,8 +12,8 @@ EXPOSE 22
 COPY scripts/cloud-entrypoint.sh /root/cloud-entrypoint.sh
 COPY scripts/motd /etc/motd
 
-RUN pip install jupyterlab notebook ipywidgets && \
-    jupyter lab clean
+RUN uv pip install --python "$VENV_PYTHON" jupyterlab notebook ipywidgets && \
+    "$VENV_PYTHON" -m jupyter lab clean
 RUN apt update && \
     apt install --yes --no-install-recommends openssh-server tmux iproute2 nvtop && \
     rm -rf /var/cache/apt/archives && \

docker/Dockerfile-cloud-no-tmux

@@ -12,8 +12,8 @@ EXPOSE 22
 COPY scripts/cloud-entrypoint.sh /root/cloud-entrypoint.sh
 COPY scripts/motd /etc/motd
 
-RUN pip install jupyterlab notebook ipywidgets && \
-    jupyter lab clean
+RUN uv pip install --python "$VENV_PYTHON" jupyterlab notebook ipywidgets && \
+    "$VENV_PYTHON" -m jupyter lab clean
 RUN apt update && \
     apt install --yes --no-install-recommends openssh-server tmux iproute2 nvtop ibverbs-providers ibverbs-utils infiniband-diags librdmacm-dev librdmacm1 rdmacm-utils slurm-wlm && \
     rm -rf /var/cache/apt/archives && \

docker/Dockerfile-tests

@@ -24,13 +24,14 @@ RUN git fetch origin +$GITHUB_REF && \
 
 # If AXOLOTL_EXTRAS is set, append it in brackets
 RUN if [ "$AXOLOTL_EXTRAS" != "" ] ; then \
-        pip install --no-build-isolation -e .[deepspeed,flash-attn,mamba-ssm,$AXOLOTL_EXTRAS] $AXOLOTL_ARGS; \
+        uv pip install --no-build-isolation -e .[deepspeed,mamba-ssm,$AXOLOTL_EXTRAS] $AXOLOTL_ARGS; \
     else \
-        pip install --no-build-isolation -e .[deepspeed,flash-attn,mamba-ssm] $AXOLOTL_ARGS; \
-    fi
+        uv pip install --no-build-isolation -e .[deepspeed,mamba-ssm] $AXOLOTL_ARGS; \
+    fi && \
+    uv pip install --no-build-isolation flash-attn $AXOLOTL_ARGS
 
 # So we can test the Docker image
-RUN pip install pytest
+RUN uv pip install pytest
 
 # fix so that git fetch/pull from remote works
 RUN git config remote.origin.fetch "+refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*" && \

docker/Dockerfile-uv-base

@@ -13,6 +13,7 @@ ARG TORCH_CUDA_ARCH_LIST="7.0 7.5 8.0 8.6 9.0+PTX"
 ENV PYTHON_VERSION=$PYTHON_VERSION
 ENV TORCH_CUDA_ARCH_LIST=$TORCH_CUDA_ARCH_LIST
 ENV UV_TORCH_BACKEND="cu${CUDA}"
+ENV VENV_PYTHON=/workspace/axolotl-venv/bin/python
 
 RUN apt-get update \
     && apt-get install -y wget git build-essential ninja-build git-lfs libaio-dev pkg-config curl && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/* \
@@ -29,8 +30,8 @@ RUN uv venv --no-project --relocatable axolotl-venv
 
 ENV PATH="/workspace/axolotl-venv/bin:${PATH}"
 
-RUN uv pip install packaging setuptools wheel psutil \
-    && uv pip install torch==${PYTORCH_VERSION} \
-    && uv pip install --no-build-isolation "causal_conv1d @ git+https://github.com/Dao-AILab/causal-conv1d.git@main" \
-    && uv pip install "mamba_ssm @ git+https://github.com/state-spaces/mamba.git@main" \
-    && uv pip install awscli pydantic
+RUN uv pip install --python "$VENV_PYTHON" packaging setuptools wheel psutil protobuf grpclib \
+    && uv pip install --python "$VENV_PYTHON" torch==${PYTORCH_VERSION} \
+    && uv pip install --python "$VENV_PYTHON" --no-build-isolation "causal_conv1d @ git+https://github.com/Dao-AILab/causal-conv1d.git@main" \
+    && uv pip install --python "$VENV_PYTHON" "mamba_ssm @ git+https://github.com/state-spaces/mamba.git@main" \
+    && uv pip install --python "$VENV_PYTHON" awscli pydantic

docs/dataset-formats/conversation.qmd

@@ -212,6 +212,14 @@ Instead of passing `tools` via the system prompt, an alternative method would be
 Tools need to follow [JSON schema](https://json-schema.org/learn/getting-started-step-by-step).
 :::
 
+::: {.callout-warning}
+If you have tool arguments with same name but different dtypes (like `"time": string` and `"time": number`), please save `arguments: ` as JSON string to prevent `datasets` from having casting issues.
+
+```
+"arguments": "{\"...\": \"...\"}"
+```
+:::
+
 Example config for Llama4:
 ```yaml
 chat_template: llama4

docs/dataset-formats/index.qmd

@@ -61,7 +61,7 @@ While we recommend `.jsonl`, you can also use the other formats (`csv`, `parquet
 
 ### Pre-training without streaming
 
-On the rare case that the dataset is small and can be loaded entirely into memory, another approach to running pre-training is to use the `completion` format. This would mean that the entire dataset is pre-tokenized instead of on-demand in streaming.
+In the case that the dataset is small and can be loaded entirely into memory, another approach to running pre-training is to use the `completion` format. This would mean that the entire dataset is pre-tokenized instead of on-demand in streaming.
 
 One benefit of this is that the tokenization can be performed separately on a CPU-only machine, and then transferred to a GPU machine for training to save costs.
 

docs/debugging.qmd

@@ -72,8 +72,8 @@ datasets:
 Make sure you have an [editable install](https://setuptools.pypa.io/en/latest/userguide/development_mode.html) of Axolotl, which ensures that changes you make to the code are reflected at runtime.  Run the following commands from the root of this project:
 
 ```bash
-pip3 install packaging
-pip3 install --no-build-isolation -e '.[flash-attn,deepspeed]'
+uv sync --extra deepspeed
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
 ```
 
 #### Remote Hosts
@@ -213,8 +213,8 @@ docker run --privileged --gpus '"all"' --shm-size 10g --rm -it --name axolotl --
 You will now be in the container.  Next, perform an editable install of Axolotl:
 
 ```bash
-pip3 install packaging
-pip3 install --no-build-isolation -e '.[flash-attn,deepspeed]'
+uv sync --extra deepspeed
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
 ```
 
 ### Attach To Container

docs/faq.qmd

@@ -140,3 +140,7 @@ description: Frequently asked questions
 **Q: `ValueError("Backward pass should have cleared tracker of all tensors")`
 
 > A: This may happen due to edge cases in using the modern OffloadActivations context manager for CUDA streams. If you encounter this error, you may have success using the naive implementation with `offload_activations: legacy` in your YAML.
+
+**Q: `Error parsing tool_calls arguments as JSON.`
+
+> A: There is an error parsing string arguments to a dict. Please check your dataset and the error message for more details.

docs/fsdp_qlora.qmd

@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
 ---
-title: "FDSP + QLoRA"
+title: "FSDP + QLoRA"
 description: Use FSDP with QLoRA to fine-tune large LLMs on consumer GPUs.
 format:
   html:
@@ -23,6 +23,12 @@ To enable `QLoRA` with `FSDP`, you need to perform the following steps:
 2. Enable FSDP in your axolotl config, as [described here](multi-gpu.qmd#sec-fsdp).
 3. Use one of the supported model types: `llama`, `mistral` or `mixtral`.
 
+## Enabling Swap for FSDP2
+
+If available memory is insufficient even after FSDP's CPU offloading, you can enable swap memory usage by setting `cpu_offload_pin_memory: false` alongside `offload_params: true` in FSDP config.
+
+This disables memory pinning, allowing FSDP to use disk swap space as fallback. Disabling memory pinning itself incurs performance overhead, and actually having to use swap adds more, but it may enable training larger models that would otherwise cause OOM errors on resource constrained systems.
+
 ## Example Config
 
 [examples/llama-2/qlora-fsdp.yml](../examples/llama-2/qlora-fsdp.yml) contains an example of how to enable QLoRA + FSDP in axolotl.

docs/installation.qmd

@@ -29,19 +29,40 @@ Follow the instructions at: [https://pytorch.org/get-started/locally/](https://p
 For Blackwell GPUs, please use Pytorch 2.7.0 and CUDA 12.8.
 :::
 
-### PyPI Installation (Recommended) {#sec-pypi}
+### uv Installation (Recommended) {#sec-uv-quick}
 
 ```{.bash}
-pip3 install -U packaging setuptools wheel ninja
-pip3 install --no-build-isolation axolotl[flash-attn,deepspeed]
+# Install uv if not already installed
+curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh
+
+# Add Axolotl to a project (recommended)
+uv init my-project && cd my-project
+uv add axolotl
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
+source .venv/bin/activate
+```
+
+For a quick one-off install without creating a project:
+
+```{.bash}
+uv pip install axolotl
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
+```
+
+### pip Installation {#sec-pypi}
+
+```{.bash}
+pip install --no-build-isolation axolotl[deepspeed]
+pip install --no-build-isolation flash-attn
 ```
 
 We use `--no-build-isolation` in order to detect the installed PyTorch version (if
 installed) in order not to clobber it, and so that we set the correct version of
 dependencies that are specific to the PyTorch version or other installed
-co-dependencies.
+co-dependencies. Flash Attention is resolved separately so it can be built against
+the environment configured by the previous step.
 
-### uv Installation {#sec-uv}
+### Advanced uv Installation {#sec-uv}
 
 uv is a fast, reliable Python package installer and resolver built in Rust. It offers significant performance improvements over pip and provides better dependency resolution, making it an excellent choice for complex environments.
 
@@ -62,28 +83,38 @@ source .venv/bin/activate
 Install PyTorch
 - PyTorch 2.6.0 recommended
 ```{.bash}
-uv pip install packaging setuptools wheel
 uv pip install torch==2.6.0
 uv pip install awscli pydantic
 ```
 
 Install axolotl from PyPi
 ```{.bash}
-uv pip install --no-build-isolation axolotl[deepspeed,flash-attn]
-
+uv pip install --no-build-isolation axolotl[deepspeed]
 # optionally install with vLLM if you're using torch==2.6.0 and want to train w/ GRPO
-uv pip install --no-build-isolation axolotl[deepspeed,flash-attn,vllm]
+# uv pip install --no-build-isolation axolotl[deepspeed,vllm]
+
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
 ```
 
 ### Edge/Development Build {#sec-edge-build}
 
 For the latest features between releases:
 
+#### Using uv (recommended)
 ```{.bash}
 git clone https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl.git
 cd axolotl
-pip3 install -U packaging setuptools wheel ninja
-pip3 install --no-build-isolation -e '.[flash-attn,deepspeed]'
+curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh  # If not already installed
+uv sync
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
+```
+
+#### Using pip
+```{.bash}
+git clone https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl.git
+cd axolotl
+pip install --no-build-isolation -e '.[deepspeed]'
+pip install --no-build-isolation flash-attn
 ```
 
 ### Docker {#sec-docker}
@@ -134,14 +165,14 @@ For providers supporting Docker:
 
 ### Google Colab {#sec-colab}
 
-Use our [example notebook](../examples/colab-notebooks/colab-axolotl-example.ipynb).
+[![](https://colab.research.google.com/assets/colab-badge.svg)](https://colab.research.google.com/github/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl/blob/main/examples/colab-notebooks/colab-axolotl-example.ipynb#scrollTo=msOCO4NRmRLa)
 
 ## Platform-Specific Instructions {#sec-platform-specific}
 
 ### macOS {#sec-macos}
 
 ```{.bash}
-pip3 install --no-build-isolation -e '.'
+uv pip install --no-build-isolation -e '.'
 ```
 
 See @sec-troubleshooting for Mac-specific issues.
@@ -159,10 +190,15 @@ We recommend using WSL2 (Windows Subsystem for Linux) or Docker.
 1. Install Python ≥3.11
 2. Install PyTorch: https://pytorch.org/get-started/locally/
 3. Install Axolotl:
-   ```{.bash}
-   pip3 install -U packaging setuptools wheel ninja
-   pip3 install --no-build-isolation -e '.[flash-attn,deepspeed]'
-   ```
+```{.bash}
+# Option A: add Axolotl to the environment
+uv add axolotl
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
+
+# Option B: quick install
+uv pip install axolotl
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
+```
 4. (Optional) Login to Hugging Face:
    ```{.bash}
    huggingface-cli login

docs/lora_optims.qmd

@@ -5,10 +5,11 @@ description: "Custom autograd functions and Triton kernels in Axolotl for optimi
 
 Inspired by [Unsloth](https://github.com/unslothai/unsloth), we've implemented two
 optimizations for LoRA and QLoRA fine-tuning, supporting both single GPU and multi-GPU
-(in the DDP and DeepSpeed settings) training. These include (1) SwiGLU and GEGLU activation function
-Triton kernels, and (2) LoRA MLP and attention custom autograd functions. Our goal was
-to leverage operator fusion and tensor re-use in order to improve speed and reduce
-memory usage during the forward and backward passes of these calculations.
+(including the DDP, DeepSpeed, and FSDP2 settings) training. These include (1) SwiGLU
+and GEGLU activation function Triton kernels, and (2) LoRA MLP and attention custom
+autograd functions. Our goal was to leverage operator fusion and tensor re-use in order
+to improve speed and reduce memory usage during the forward and backward passes of
+these calculations.
 
 We currently support several common model architectures, including (but not limited to):
 
@@ -131,6 +132,5 @@ computation path.
 ## Future Work
 
 - Support for additional model architectures
-- Support for the FSDP setting
 - Support for dropout and bias
 - Additional operator fusions

docs/multi-gpu.qmd

@@ -63,15 +63,6 @@ Start from Stage 1 -> Stage 2 -> Stage 3.
 
 :::
 
-::: {.callout-tip}
-
-Using ZeRO Stage 3 with Single-GPU training
-
-ZeRO Stage 3 can be used for training on a single GPU by manually setting the environment variables:
-`WORLD_SIZE=1 LOCAL_RANK=0 MASTER_ADDR=0.0.0.0 MASTER_PORT=29500`
-
-:::
-
 ## Fully Sharded Data Parallel (FSDP) {#sec-fsdp}
 
 ::: {.callout-note}

docs/multimodal.qmd

@@ -13,6 +13,7 @@ format:
 - [Pixtral](#sec-pixtral)
 - [Llava-1.5](#sec-llava-15)
 - [Mistral-Small-3.1](#sec-mistral-small-31)
+- [Magistral-Small-2509](#sec-magistral-small-2509)
 - [Voxtral](#sec-voxtral)
 - [Gemma-3](#sec-gemma-3)
 - [Gemma-3n](#sec-gemma-3n)
@@ -41,7 +42,6 @@ datasets:
   - path: HuggingFaceH4/llava-instruct-mix-vsft
     type: chat_template
     split: train[:1%]
-    field_messages: messages
 
 # (optional) if doing lora, only finetune the Language model,
 # leave the vision model and vision tower frozen
@@ -94,16 +94,28 @@ chat_template: llava
 
 ### Mistral-Small-3.1 {#sec-mistral-small-31}
 
+::: {.callout-tip}
+Please make sure to install vision lib via `uv pip install 'mistral-common[opencv]==1.8.5'`
+:::
+
 ```yaml
 base_model: mistralai/Mistral-Small-3.1-24B-Instruct-2503
+```
 
-chat_template: mistral_v7_tekken
+### Magistral-Small-2509 {#sec-magistral-small-2509}
+
+::: {.callout-tip}
+Please make sure to install vision lib via `uv pip install 'mistral-common[opencv]==1.8.5'`
+:::
+
+```yaml
+base_model: mistralai/Magistral-Small-2509
 ```
 
 ### Voxtral {#sec-voxtral}
 
 ::: {.callout-tip}
-Please make sure to install audio lib via `pip3 install librosa==0.11.0 'mistral_common[audio]==1.8.3'`
+Please make sure to install audio lib via `uv pip install librosa==0.11.0 'mistral_common[audio]==1.8.3'`
 :::
 
 ```yaml
@@ -131,7 +143,7 @@ The model's initial loss and grad norm will be very high. We suspect this to be
 :::
 
 ::: {.callout-tip}
-Please make sure to install `timm` via `pip3 install timm==1.0.17`
+Please make sure to install `timm` via `uv pip install timm==1.0.17`
 :::
 
 ```yaml
@@ -159,7 +171,7 @@ chat_template: qwen2_vl  # same as qwen2-vl
 ### SmolVLM2 {#sec-smolvlm2}
 
 ::: {.callout-tip}
-Please make sure to install `num2words` via `pip3 install num2words==0.5.14`
+Please make sure to install `num2words` via `uv pip install num2words==0.5.14`
 :::
 
 ```yaml
@@ -169,7 +181,7 @@ base_model: HuggingFaceTB/SmolVLM2-500M-Video-Instruct
 ### LFM2-VL {#sec-lfm2-vl}
 
 ::: {.callout-warning}
-Please uninstall `causal-conv1d` via `pip3 uninstall -y causal-conv1d`
+Please uninstall `causal-conv1d` via `uv pip uninstall -y causal-conv1d`
 :::
 
 ```yaml
@@ -210,7 +222,7 @@ For audio loading, you can use the following keys within `content` alongside `"t
 
 ::: {.callout-tip}
 
-You may need to install `librosa` via `pip3 install librosa==0.11.0`.
+You may need to install `librosa` via `uv pip install librosa==0.11.0`.
 
 :::
 

docs/optimizations.qmd

@@ -0,0 +1,133 @@
+---
+title: Optimizations Guide
+description: A guide to the performance and memory optimizations available in Axolotl.
+---
+
+Axolotl includes numerous optimizations to speed up training, reduce memory usage, and handle large models.
+
+This guide provides a high-level overview and directs you to the detailed documentation for each feature.
+
+## Speed Optimizations
+
+These optimizations focus on increasing training throughput and reducing total training time.
+
+### Sample Packing
+
+Improves GPU utilization by combining multiple short sequences into a single packed sequence for training. This requires enabling one of the [attention](#attention-implementations) implementations below.
+
+- **Config:** `sample_packing: true`
+- **Learn more:** [Sample Packing](multipack.qmd)
+
+### Attention Implementations
+
+Using an optimized attention implementation is critical for training speed.
+
+- **[Flash Attention 2](https://github.com/Dao-AILab/flash-attention)**: `flash_attention: true`. **(Recommended)** The industry standard for fast attention on modern GPUs. Requires Ampere or higher. For AMD, check [AMD Support](https://github.com/Dao-AILab/flash-attention?tab=readme-ov-file#amd-rocm-support).
+- **[Flex Attention](https://pytorch.org/blog/flexattention/)**: `flex_attention: true`.
+- **[SDP Attention](https://docs.pytorch.org/docs/stable/generated/torch.nn.functional.scaled_dot_product_attention.html)**: `sdp_attention: true`. PyTorch's native implementation.
+- **[Xformers](https://github.com/facebookresearch/xformers)**: `xformers_attention: true`. Works with FP16.
+
+*Note: You should only enable one attention backend.*
+
+### LoRA Optimizations
+
+Leverages optimized kernels to accelerate LoRA training and reduce memory usage.
+
+- **Learn more:** [LoRA Optimizations Documentation](lora_optims.qmd)
+
+## Memory Optimizations
+
+These techniques help you fit larger models or use bigger batch sizes on your existing hardware.
+
+### Parameter Efficient Finetuning (LoRA & QLoRA)
+
+Drastically reduces memory by training a small set of "adapter" parameters instead of the full model. This is the most common and effective memory-saving technique.
+
+- Examples: Find configs with `lora` or `qlora` in the [examples directory](https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl/tree/main/examples/llama-3).
+- Config Reference: See `adapter`, `load_in_4bit`, and `load_in_8bit` in the [Configuration Reference](config-reference.qmd).
+
+### Gradient Checkpointing & Activation Offloading
+
+These techniques save VRAM by changing how activations are handled.
+
+- Gradient Checkpointing: re-computes activations during the backward pass, trading compute time for VRAM.
+- Activation Offloading: moves activations to CPU RAM or disk, trading I/O overhead for VRAM.
+- Learn more: [Gradient Checkpointing and Offloading Docs](gradient_checkpointing.qmd)
+
+### Cut Cross Entropy (CCE)
+
+Reduces VRAM usage by using an optimized cross-entropy loss calculation.
+
+- **Learn more:** [Custom Integrations - CCE](custom_integrations.qmd#cut-cross-entropy)
+
+### Liger Kernels
+
+Provides efficient Triton kernels to improve training speed and reduce memory usage.
+
+- **Learn more:** [Custom Integrations - Liger Kernels](custom_integrations.qmd#liger-kernels)
+
+## Long Context Models
+
+Techniques to train models on sequences longer than their original context window.
+
+### RoPE Scaling
+
+Extends a model's context window by interpolating its Rotary Position Embeddings.
+
+- **Config:** Pass the `rope_scaling` config under the `overrides_of_model_config: `. To learn how to set RoPE, check the respective model config.
+
+### Sequence Parallelism
+
+Splits long sequences across multiple GPUs, enabling training with sequence lengths that would not fit on a single device.
+
+- **Learn more:** [Sequence Parallelism Documentation](sequence_parallelism.qmd)
+
+### Artic Long Sequence Training (ALST)
+
+ALST is a recipe that combines several techniques to train long-context models efficiently. It typically involves:
+
+- TiledMLP to reduce memory usage in MLP layers.
+- Tiled Loss functions (like [CCE](#cut-cross-entropy-(cce) or [Liger](#liger-kernels)).
+- Activation Offloading to CPU.
+
+- Example: [ALST Example Configuration](https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl/tree/main/examples/alst)
+
+## Large Models (Distributed Training)
+
+To train models that don't fit on a single GPU, you'll need to use a distributed training strategy like FSDP or DeepSpeed. These frameworks shard the model weights, gradients, and optimizer states across multiple GPUs and nodes.
+
+- **Learn more:** [Multi-GPU Guide](multi-gpu.qmd)
+- **Learn more:** [Multi-Node Guide](multi-node.qmd)
+
+### N-D Parallelism (Beta)
+
+For advanced scaling, Axolotl allows you to compose different parallelism techniques (e.g., Data, Tensor, Sequence Parallelism). This is a powerful approach to train an extremely large model by overcoming multiple bottlenecks at once.
+
+- **Learn more:** [N-D Parallelism Guide](nd_parallelism.qmd)
+
+
+## Quantization
+
+Techniques to reduce the precision of model weights for memory savings.
+
+### 4-bit Training (QLoRA)
+
+The recommended approach for quantization-based training. It loads the base model in 4-bit using `bitsandbytes` and then trains QLoRA adapters. See [Adapter Finetuning](#adapter-finetuning-lora-qlora) for details.
+
+### FP8 Training
+
+Enables training with 8-bit floating point precision on supported hardware (e.g., NVIDIA Hopper series GPUs) for significant speed and memory gains.
+
+- **Example:** [Llama 3 FP8 FSDP Example](https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl/blob/main/examples/llama-3/3b-fp8-fsdp2.yaml)
+
+### Quantization Aware Training (QAT)
+
+Simulates quantization effects during training, helping the model adapt and potentially improving the final accuracy of the quantized model.
+
+- **Learn more:** [QAT Documentation](qat.qmd)
+
+### GPTQ
+
+Allows you to finetune LoRA adapters on top of a model that has already been quantized using the GPTQ method.
+
+- **Example:** [GPTQ LoRA Example](https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl/blob/main/examples/llama-2/gptq-lora.yml)

docs/qat.qmd

@@ -23,10 +23,18 @@ To enable QAT in axolotl, add the following to your configuration file:
 
 ```yaml
 qat:
-  activation_dtype: # Optional[str] = "int8". Fake quantization layout to use for activation quantization. Valid options are "int4" and "int8"
-  weight_dtype: # Optional[str] = "int8". Fake quantization layout to use for weight quantization. Valid options are "int4" and "int8"
+  activation_dtype: # Optional[str] = "int8". Fake quantization layout to use for activation quantization. Valid options are "int4", "int8", "float8"
+  weight_dtype: # Optional[str] = "int8". Fake quantization layout to use for weight quantization. Valid options are "int4", "fp8", and "nvfp4".
   group_size: # Optional[int] = 32. The number of elements in each group for per-group fake quantization
   fake_quant_after_n_steps: # Optional[int] = None. The number of steps to apply fake quantization after
 ```
 
+We support the following quantization schemas:
+
+- `Int4WeightOnly` (requires the `fbgemm-gpu` extra when installing Axolotl)
+- `Int8DynamicActivationInt4Weight`
+- `Float8DynamicActivationFloat8Weight`
+- `Float8DynamicActivationInt4Weight`
+- `NVFP4`
+
 Once you have finished training, you must quantize your model by using the same quantization configuration which you used to train the model with. You can use the [`quantize`](./quantize.qmd) command to do this.

docs/quantize.qmd

@@ -22,8 +22,8 @@ Quantization is configured using the `quantization` key in your configuration fi
 ```yaml
 base_model: # The path to the model to quantize.
 quantization:
-  weight_dtype: # Optional[str] = "int8". Fake quantization layout to use for weight quantization. Valid options are uintX for X in [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7], or int4, or int8
-  activation_dtype: # Optional[str] = "int8". Fake quantization layout to use for activation quantization. Valid options are "int4" and "int8"
+  activation_dtype: # Optional[str] = "int8". Fake quantization layout to use for activation quantization. Valid options are "int4", "int8", "float8"
+  weight_dtype: # Optional[str] = "int8". Fake quantization layout to use for weight quantization. Valid options are "int4", "fp8", and "nvfp4".
   group_size: # Optional[int] = 32. The number of elements in each group for per-group fake quantization
   quantize_embedding: # Optional[bool] = False. Whether to quantize the embedding layer.
 
@@ -39,9 +39,8 @@ you used to train the model:
 # qat.yml
 qat:
   activation_dtype: int8
-  weight_dtype: int8
+  weight_dtype: int4
   group_size: 256
-  quantize_embedding: true
 
 output_dir: # The path to the output directory used during training where the final checkpoint has been saved.
 ```
@@ -51,3 +50,11 @@ axolotl quantize qat.yml
 ```
 
 This ensures that an identical quantization configuration is used to quantize the model as was used to train it.
+
+
+::: {.callout-note}
+
+If you have configured pushing to hub with `hub_model_id`, your model hub name will have the quantization schema appended to it,
+e.g. `axolotl-ai-cloud/qat-nvfp4-llama3B` will become `axolotl-ai-cloud/qat-nvfp4-llama3B-nvfp4w`
+
+:::

docs/reward_modelling.qmd

@@ -11,6 +11,7 @@ We support the reward modelling techniques supported by `trl`.
 ### (Outcome) Reward Models
 
 Outcome reward models are trained using data which contains preference annotations for an entire interaction between the user and model (e.g. rather than per-turn or per-step).
+For improved training stability, you can use the `center_rewards_coefficient` parameter to encourage mean-zero reward outputs ([see TRL docs](https://huggingface.co/docs/trl/v0.10.1/en/reward_trainer#centering-rewards)).
 
 ```yaml
 base_model: google/gemma-2-2b

docs/scripts/generate_config_docs.py

@@ -47,7 +47,6 @@ class QuartoGenerator:
         """Check if a type is a Pydantic BaseModel."""
         return inspect.isclass(type_obj) and issubclass(type_obj, BaseModel)
 
-    # pylint: disable=too-many-return-statements
     def _extract_nested_type(self, field_type) -> Any:
         """Extract the actual type from complex type annotations."""
         # Handle Annotated types (Python 3.9+)
@@ -124,7 +123,6 @@ class QuartoGenerator:
 
         return field_type
 
-    # pylint: disable=too-many-return-statements
     def _extract_all_pydantic_models_from_type(
         self, field_type
     ) -> list[type[BaseModel]]:
@@ -318,7 +316,6 @@ class QuartoGenerator:
 
         return all_groups
 
-    # pylint: disable=too-many-return-statements
     def _extract_field_groups_from_source(
         self, model_class: type[BaseModel]
     ) -> list[dict]:
@@ -503,7 +500,7 @@ class QuartoGenerator:
                     nested_schema = nested_model.model_json_schema()
                     nested_properties = nested_schema.get("properties", {})
                     nested_required = nested_schema.get("required", [])
-                except Exception:  # pylint: disable=broad-exception-caught
+                except Exception:
                     # Fallback: use model fields directly
                     nested_properties = {}
                     nested_required = []
@@ -607,7 +604,7 @@ class QuartoGenerator:
             schema = model_class.model_json_schema()
             properties = schema.get("properties", {})
             required = schema.get("required", [])
-        except Exception as e:  # pylint: disable=broad-exception-caught
+        except Exception as e:
             print(
                 f"Warning: Could not generate JSON schema ({e}). Using model fields instead."
             )

docs/sequence_parallelism.qmd

@@ -49,9 +49,9 @@ When sequence parallelism is enabled:
 To use sequence parallelism, you need:
 
 - Multiple GPUs (at least 2)
-- The `ring-flash-attn` package. Install with:
-  - `pip install axolotl[ring-flash-attn]` (preferred)
-  - `pip install ring-flash-attn>=0.1.4`
+- The `ring-flash-attn` package. Install with either `uv sync --extra ring-flash-attn`
+  (from a cloned repository) or `uv pip install ring-flash-attn>=0.1.4`.
+- Flash Attention installed separately with `uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation`.
 
 ## Limitations
 

docs/streaming.qmd

@@ -0,0 +1,120 @@
+---
+title: Streaming Datasets
+description: How to use streaming mode for large-scale datasets and memory-efficient training
+order: 10
+---
+
+Streaming enables memory-efficient training with large datasets by loading data
+incrementally rather than loading the entire dataset into memory at once.
+
+Use streaming when:
+
+- Your dataset is too large to fit in memory (e.g. when you're doing pretraining with massive text corpora)
+- You want to start training immediately without preprocessing the entire dataset
+
+Streaming works with both remote and locally stored datasets!
+
+::: {.callout-note}
+Streaming currently only supports a single dataset. Multi-dataset support will be added soon.
+:::
+
+
+## Configuration
+
+### Basic Streaming
+
+Enable streaming mode by setting the `streaming` flag:
+
+```yaml
+streaming: true
+```
+
+### Pretraining with Streaming
+
+For pretraining tasks, streaming is automatically enabled when using `pretraining_dataset`:
+
+```yaml
+pretraining_dataset:
+  - path: HuggingFaceFW/fineweb-edu
+    type: pretrain
+    text_column: text
+    split: train
+
+# Optionally, enable sample packing
+streaming_multipack_buffer_size: 10000
+sample_packing: true
+```
+
+### SFT with Streaming
+
+For supervised fine-tuning with streaming:
+
+```yaml
+streaming: true
+datasets:
+  - path: tatsu-lab/alpaca
+    type: alpaca
+    split: train
+
+# Optionally, enable sample packing
+streaming_multipack_buffer_size: 10000
+sample_packing: true
+```
+
+## Configuration Options
+
+### `streaming_multipack_buffer_size`
+
+Controls the buffer size for multipack streaming (default: 10,000). This determines how
+many samples are buffered before packing. Larger buffers can improve packing efficiency
+but use more memory.
+
+### `shuffle_merged_datasets`
+
+When enabled, shuffles the streaming dataset using the buffer. This requires additional
+memory for the shuffle buffer.
+
+## Sample Packing with Streaming
+
+Sample packing is supported for streaming datasets. When enabled, multiple samples are
+packed into a single sequence to maximize GPU utilization:
+
+```yaml
+sample_packing: true
+streaming_multipack_buffer_size: 10000
+
+# For SFT: attention is automatically isolated between packed samples
+# For pretraining: control with pretrain_multipack_attn
+pretrain_multipack_attn: true  # prevent cross-attention between packed samples
+```
+
+For more information, see our [documentation](multipack.qmd) on multipacking.
+
+## Important Considerations
+
+### Memory Usage
+
+While streaming reduces memory usage compared to loading entire datasets, you still need
+to consider:
+
+- You can control the memory usage by adjusting `streaming_multipack_buffer_size`
+- Sample packing requires buffering multiple samples
+- Shuffling requires additional memory for the shuffle buffer
+
+### Performance
+
+- Streaming may have slightly higher latency compared to preprocessed datasets, as samples are processed on-the-fly
+- Network speed and disk read speed are important when streaming from remote sources or a local dataset, respectively
+- Consider using `axolotl preprocess` for smaller or more frequently used datasets
+
+### Evaluation Datasets
+
+Evaluation datasets are not streamed to ensure consistent evaluation metrics. They're
+loaded normally even when training uses streaming.
+
+## Examples
+
+See the `examples/streaming/` directory for complete configuration examples:
+
+- `pretrain.yaml`: Pretraining with streaming dataset
+- `sft.yaml`: Supervised fine-tuning with streaming

examples/LiquidAI/README.md

@@ -12,9 +12,14 @@ This guide shows how to fine-tune both the LFM2 and LFM2-VL models with Axolotl.
 
     Here is an example of how to install from pip:
     ```bash
-    # Ensure you have a compatible version of Pytorch installed
-    pip3 install packaging setuptools wheel ninja
-    pip3 install --no-build-isolation 'axolotl[flash-attn]>=0.12.0'
+    # Ensure you have a compatible version of PyTorch installed
+    # Option A: manage dependencies in your project
+    uv add 'axolotl>=0.12.0'
+    uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
+
+    # Option B: quick install
+    uv pip install 'axolotl>=0.12.0'
+    uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
     ```
 
 2.  Run one of the finetuning examples below.
@@ -35,7 +40,7 @@ This guide shows how to fine-tune both the LFM2 and LFM2-VL models with Axolotl.
 
 - **Installation Error**: If you encounter `ImportError: ... undefined symbol ...` or `ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'causal_conv1d_cuda'`, the `causal-conv1d` package may have been installed incorrectly. Try uninstalling it:
   ```bash
-  pip uninstall -y causal-conv1d
+  uv pip uninstall -y causal-conv1d
   ```
 
 - **Dataset Loading**: Read more on how to load your own dataset in our [documentation](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/dataset_loading.html).

examples/alst/README.md

@@ -7,3 +7,24 @@ techniques. It is a combination of:
 - Activation Offloading: Offload activations to CPU RAM to reduce memory usage
 
 For more information, you can check out the ALST paper [here](https://www.arxiv.org/abs/2506.13996).
+
+## Usage
+
+```yaml
+tiled_mlp: true
+
+# See Sequence Parallelism docs
+# https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/sequence_parallelism.html
+context_parallel_size: int
+
+plugins:
+# See Cut Cross Entropy docs
+# https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/custom_integrations.html#cut-cross-entropy
+  - axolotl.integrations.cut_cross_entropy.CutCrossEntropyPlugin
+
+# or Liger Kernel docs
+# https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/custom_integrations.html#liger-kernels
+  - axolotl.integrations.liger.LigerPlugin
+# ...
+
+```

examples/apertus/README.md

@@ -0,0 +1,110 @@
+# Finetune Swiss-AI's Apertus with Axolotl
+
+[Apertus](https://huggingface.co/collections/swiss-ai/apertus-llm-68b699e65415c231ace3b059) is a family of opensource models trained by Swiss-ai.
+
+This guide shows how to fine-tune it with Axolotl with multi-turn conversations and proper masking.
+
+## Getting started
+
+1. Install Axolotl following the [installation guide](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/installation.html). You need to install from main as Apertus is only on nightly or use our latest [Docker images](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/docker.html).
+
+    Here is an example of how to install from main for pip:
+
+```bash
+# Ensure you have Pytorch installed (Pytorch 2.6.0 min)
+git clone https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl.git
+cd axolotl
+
+uv sync
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
+
+# Install CCE https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/custom_integrations.html#cut-cross-entropy
+python scripts/cutcrossentropy_install.py | sh
+```
+
+2. (Optional, highly recommended) Install XIELU CUDA
+
+```bash
+## Recommended for reduced VRAM and faster speeds
+
+# Point to CUDA toolkit directory
+# For those using our Docker image, use the below path.
+export CUDA_HOME=/usr/local/cuda
+
+uv pip install git+https://github.com/nickjbrowning/XIELU@59d6031 --no-build-isolation --no-deps
+```
+
+For any installation errors, see [XIELU Installation Issues](#xielu-installation-issues)
+
+3. Run the finetuning example:
+
+```bash
+axolotl train examples/apertus/apertus-8b-qlora.yaml
+```
+
+This config uses about 8.7 GiB VRAM.
+
+Let us know how it goes. Happy finetuning! 🚀
+
+### Tips
+
+- For inference, the official Apertus team recommends `top_p=0.9` and `temperature=0.8`.
+- You can instead use full paremter fine-tuning by removing the `adapter: qlora` and `load_in_4bit: true` from the config.
+- Read more on how to load your own dataset at [docs](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/dataset_loading.html).
+- The dataset format follows the OpenAI Messages format as seen [here](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/dataset-formats/conversation.html#chat_template).
+
+### XIELU Installation Issues
+
+#### `ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'torch'`
+
+Please check these one by one:
+- Running in correct environment
+- Env has PyTorch installed
+- CUDA toolkit is at `CUDA_HOME`
+
+If those didn't help, please try the below solutions:
+
+1. Pass env for CMAKE and try install again:
+
+    ```bash
+    Python_EXECUTABLE=$(which python) uv pip install git+https://github.com/nickjbrowning/XIELU@59d6031 --no-build-isolation --no-deps
+    ```
+
+2. Git clone the repo and manually hardcode python path:
+
+    ```bash
+    git clone https://github.com/nickjbrowning/XIELU
+    cd xielu
+    git checkout 59d6031
+
+    cd xielu
+    nano CMakeLists.txt  # or vi depending on your preference
+    ```
+
+    ```diff
+    execute_process(
+    -    COMMAND ${Python_EXECUTABLE} -c "import torch.utils; print(torch.utils.cmake_prefix_path)"
+    +    COMMAND /root/miniconda3/envs/py3.11/bin/python -c "import torch.utils; print(torch.utils.cmake_prefix_path)"
+        RESULT_VARIABLE TORCH_CMAKE_PATH_RESULT
+        OUTPUT_VARIABLE TORCH_CMAKE_PATH_OUTPUT
+        ERROR_VARIABLE TORCH_CMAKE_PATH_ERROR
+    )
+    ```
+
+    ```bash
+    uv pip install . --no-build-isolation --no-deps
+    ```
+
+## Optimization Guides
+
+- [Multi-GPU Training](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/multi-gpu.html)
+- [Multi-Node Training](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/multi-node.html)
+- [LoRA Optimizations](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/lora_optims.html)
+
+## Related Resources
+
+- [Apertus Tech Report](https://github.com/swiss-ai/apertus-tech-report/blob/main/Apertus_Tech_Report.pdf)
+- [Axolotl Docs](https://docs.axolotl.ai)
+- [Axolotl Website](https://axolotl.ai)
+- [Axolotl GitHub](https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl)
+- [Axolotl Discord](https://discord.gg/7m9sfhzaf3)

examples/apertus/apertus-8b-qlora.yaml

@@ -0,0 +1,64 @@
+base_model: swiss-ai/Apertus-8B-Instruct-2509
+
+# Automatically upload checkpoint and final model to HF
+# hub_model_id: username/custom_model_name
+
+plugins:
+  - axolotl.integrations.cut_cross_entropy.CutCrossEntropyPlugin
+
+load_in_8bit: false
+load_in_4bit: true
+
+datasets:
+  - path: fozziethebeat/alpaca_messages_2k_test
+    type: chat_template
+
+dataset_prepared_path: last_run_prepared
+val_set_size: 0.1
+output_dir: ./outputs/lora-out
+
+adapter: qlora
+lora_model_dir:
+
+sequence_len: 2048
+sample_packing: true
+
+lora_r: 32
+lora_alpha: 16
+lora_dropout: 0.05
+lora_target_linear: true
+lora_target_modules:
+  - gate_proj
+  - down_proj
+  - up_proj
+  - q_proj
+  - v_proj
+  - k_proj
+  - o_proj
+
+wandb_project:
+wandb_entity:
+wandb_watch:
+wandb_name:
+wandb_log_model:
+
+gradient_accumulation_steps: 4
+micro_batch_size: 2
+num_epochs: 1
+optimizer: adamw_bnb_8bit
+lr_scheduler: cosine
+learning_rate: 0.0002
+
+bf16: auto
+tf32: false
+
+gradient_checkpointing: true
+resume_from_checkpoint:
+logging_steps: 1
+flash_attention: true
+
+warmup_ratio: 0.1
+evals_per_epoch: 1
+saves_per_epoch: 1
+
+# save_first_step: true  # uncomment this to validate checkpoint saving works with your config

examples/arcee/README.md

@@ -17,8 +17,11 @@ Thanks to the team at Arcee.ai for using Axolotl in supervised fine-tuning the A
 git clone https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl.git
 cd axolotl
 
-pip3 install packaging==23.2 setuptools==75.8.0 wheel ninja
-pip3 install --no-build-isolation -e '.[flash-attn]'
+uv sync
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
+
+# Install CCE https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/custom_integrations.html#cut-cross-entropy
+python scripts/cutcrossentropy_install.py | sh
 ```
 
 2. Run the finetuning example:

examples/archived/deepcoder/deepcoder-14B-preview-lora.yml

@@ -9,10 +9,6 @@ strict: false
 datasets:
   - path: fozziethebeat/alpaca_messages_2k_test
     type: chat_template
-    field_messages: messages
-    message_property_mappings:
-      role: role
-      content: content
 
 dataset_prepared_path:
 val_set_size: 0.05

examples/cloud/baseten.yaml

@@ -0,0 +1,10 @@
+provider: baseten
+project_name:
+
+secrets:
+  - HF_TOKEN
+  - WANDB_API_KEY
+
+gpu: h100
+gpu_count: 8
+node_count: 1

examples/deepcogito/cogito-v1-preview-llama-3B-lora.yml

@@ -9,10 +9,6 @@ strict: false
 datasets:
   - path: fozziethebeat/alpaca_messages_2k_test
     type: chat_template
-    field_messages: messages
-    message_property_mappings:
-      role: role
-      content: content
 
 dataset_prepared_path:
 val_set_size: 0.05

examples/deepcogito/cogito-v1-preview-qwen-14B-lora.yml

@@ -9,10 +9,6 @@ strict: false
 datasets:
   - path: fozziethebeat/alpaca_messages_2k_test
     type: chat_template
-    field_messages: messages
-    message_property_mappings:
-      role: role
-      content: content
 
 dataset_prepared_path:
 val_set_size: 0.05

examples/devstral/README.md

@@ -16,11 +16,22 @@ Thanks to the team at MistralAI for giving us early access to prepare for this r
 
 ```bash
 # Ensure you have Pytorch installed (Pytorch 2.6.0 min)
-pip3 install packaging==23.2 setuptools==75.8.0 wheel ninja
-pip3 install --no-build-isolation 'axolotl[flash-attn]>=0.12.0'
+# Option A: manage dependencies in your project
+uv add 'axolotl>=0.12.0'
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
+
+# Option B: quick install
+uv pip install 'axolotl>=0.12.0'
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
 ```
 
-2. Run the finetuning example:
+2. Install [Cut Cross Entropy](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/custom_integrations.html#cut-cross-entropy) to reduce training VRAM usage
+
+```bash
+python scripts/cutcrossentropy_install.py | sh
+```
+
+3. Run the finetuning example:
 
 ```bash
 axolotl train examples/devstral/devstral-small-qlora.yml

examples/gemma3/gemma-3-270m-qlora.yml

@@ -0,0 +1,68 @@
+base_model: google/gemma-3-270m-it
+# optionally might have model_type or tokenizer_type
+model_type: AutoModelForCausalLM
+tokenizer_type: AutoTokenizer
+# Automatically upload checkpoint and final model to HF
+# hub_model_id: username/custom_model_name
+
+# gemma3 doesn't seem to play nice with ddp
+ddp_find_unused_parameters: true
+
+load_in_8bit: false
+load_in_4bit: true
+
+# huggingface repo
+chat_template: gemma3
+eot_tokens:
+  - <end_of_turn>
+datasets:
+  - path: cgato/SlimOrcaDedupCleaned
+    type: chat_template
+    field_messages: conversations
+    message_property_mappings:
+      role: from
+      content: value
+
+val_set_size: 0.0
+output_dir: ./outputs/out
+
+adapter: qlora
+lora_r: 32
+lora_alpha: 16
+lora_dropout: 0.05
+lora_target_linear: true
+
+sequence_len: 2048
+sample_packing: true
+eval_sample_packing: false
+
+
+wandb_project:
+wandb_entity:
+wandb_watch:
+wandb_name:
+wandb_log_model:
+
+
+gradient_accumulation_steps: 4
+micro_batch_size: 1
+num_epochs: 1
+optimizer: adamw_bnb_8bit
+lr_scheduler: cosine
+learning_rate: 0.0002
+
+bf16: auto
+tf32: true
+
+gradient_checkpointing: true
+gradient_checkpointing_kwargs:
+  use_reentrant: false
+resume_from_checkpoint:
+logging_steps: 1
+flash_attention: true
+
+warmup_ratio: 0.1
+evals_per_epoch:
+saves_per_epoch: 1
+weight_decay: 0.0
+special_tokens:

examples/gemma3/gemma-3-4b-vision-qlora.yml

@@ -18,7 +18,7 @@ datasets:
   - path: HuggingFaceH4/llava-instruct-mix-vsft
     type: chat_template
     split: train[:1%]
-    field_messages: messages
+
 dataset_prepared_path: last_run_prepared
 val_set_size: 0.01
 output_dir: ./outputs/out

examples/gemma3n/README.md

@@ -10,20 +10,33 @@ Gemma-3n is a family of multimodal models from Google found on [HuggingFace](htt
 
 ```bash
 # Ensure you have Pytorch installed (Pytorch 2.6.0 min)
-pip3 install packaging==23.2 setuptools==75.8.0 wheel ninja
-pip3 install --no-build-isolation 'axolotl[flash-attn]>=0.12.0'
+# Option A: manage dependencies in your project
+uv add 'axolotl>=0.12.0'
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
+
+# Option B: quick install
+uv pip install 'axolotl>=0.12.0'
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
 ```
 
 2. In addition to Axolotl's requirements, Gemma-3n requires:
 
 ```bash
-pip3 install timm==1.0.17
+uv pip install timm==1.0.17
 
 # for loading audio data
-pip3 install librosa==0.11.0
+uv pip install librosa==0.11.0
 ```
 
-3. Run the finetuning example:
+3. Download sample dataset files
+
+```bash
+# for text + vision + audio only
+wget https://huggingface.co/datasets/Nanobit/text-vision-audio-2k-test/resolve/main/African_elephant.jpg
+wget https://huggingface.co/datasets/Nanobit/text-vision-audio-2k-test/resolve/main/En-us-African_elephant.oga
+```
+
+4. Run the finetuning example:
 
 ```bash
 # text only

examples/gpt-oss/README.md

@@ -12,8 +12,13 @@ This guide shows how to fine-tune it with Axolotl with multi-turn conversations
 
 ```bash
 # Ensure you have Pytorch installed (Pytorch 2.6.0 min)
-pip3 install packaging==23.2 setuptools==75.8.0 wheel ninja
-pip3 install --no-build-isolation 'axolotl[flash-attn]>=0.12.0'
+# Option A: manage dependencies in your project
+uv add 'axolotl>=0.12.0'
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
+
+# Option B: quick install
+uv pip install 'axolotl>=0.12.0'
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
 ```
 
 2. Choose one of the following configs below for training the 20B model. (for 120B, see [below](#training-120b))
@@ -41,6 +46,12 @@ model, and final model output, you may need at least 3TB of free disk space to k
 axolotl train examples/gpt-oss/gpt-oss-120b-fft-fsdp2-offload.yaml
 ```
 
+To simplify fine-tuning across 2 nodes × 8x H100 (80GB) GPUs, we've partnered with [Baseten](https://baseten.co) to showcase multi-node
+training of the 120B model using Baseten Truss. You can read more about this recipe on
+[Baseten's blog](https://www.baseten.co/blog/how-to-fine-tune-gpt-oss-120b-with-baseten-and-axolotl/). The recipe can
+be found on their
+[GitHub](https://github.com/basetenlabs/ml-cookbook/tree/main/examples/oss-gpt-120b-axolotl/training).
+
 ERRATA: Transformers saves the model Architecture prefixed with `FSDP` which needs to be manually renamed in `config.json`.
 See https://github.com/huggingface/transformers/pull/40207 for the status of this issue.
 
@@ -61,9 +72,23 @@ mv ./outputs/gpt-oss-out/merged/* ./outputs/gpt-oss-out/
 
 ### Inferencing your fine-tuned model
 
+#### vLLM
+
 GPT-OSS support in vLLM does not exist in a stable release yet. See https://x.com/MaziyarPanahi/status/1955741905515323425
 for more information about using a special vllm-openai docker image for inferencing with vLLM.
 
+Optionally, vLLM can be installed from nightly:
+
+```bash
+uv pip install --no-build-isolation --pre -U vllm --extra-index-url https://wheels.vllm.ai/nightly
+```
+and the vLLM server can be started with the following command (modify `--tensor-parallel-size 8` to match your environment):
+```bash
+vllm serve ./outputs/gpt-oss-out/ --served-model-name axolotl/gpt-oss-20b --host 0.0.0.0 --port 8888  --tensor-parallel-size 8
+```
+
+#### SGLang
+
 SGLang has 0-day support in main, see https://github.com/sgl-project/sglang/issues/8833 for infomation on installing
 SGLang from source. Once you've installed SGLang, run the following command to launch a SGLang server:
 
@@ -86,6 +111,16 @@ See [Nanobit/text-tools-2k-test](https://huggingface.co/datasets/Nanobit/text-to
 
 Refer to [our docs](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/dataset-formats/conversation.html#using-tool-use) for more info.
 
+### Thinking and chat_template masking conflict
+
+OpenAI’s Harmony template hides `thinking` in all non-final turns, which conflicts with Axolotl’s `chat_template` masking.
+
+If your dataset has `thinking` content mid-turn, there are two paths we recommend:
+
+- Train only on the last turn. This can be accomplished via chat_template's [train on last doc](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/dataset-formats/conversation.html#training-on-last-message).
+
+- Adjust your dataset to only have `thinking` content in the last turn.
+
 ### TIPS
 
 - Read more on how to load your own dataset at [docs](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/dataset_loading.html).

examples/gpt-oss/gpt-oss-120b-fft-fsdp2-offload.yaml

@@ -44,7 +44,7 @@ bf16: true
 tf32: true
 
 flash_attention: true
-attn_implementation: kernels-community/vllm-flash-attn3
+attn_implementation: kernels-community/vllm-flash-attn3  # this is not needed if using flash_attn >= 2.8.3
 
 gradient_checkpointing: true
 activation_offloading: true

examples/gpt-oss/gpt-oss-20b-fft-deepspeed-zero3.yaml

@@ -40,7 +40,7 @@ bf16: true
 tf32: true
 
 flash_attention: true
-attn_implementation: kernels-community/vllm-flash-attn3
+attn_implementation: kernels-community/vllm-flash-attn3  # this is not needed if using flash_attn >= 2.8.3
 
 gradient_checkpointing: true
 activation_offloading: true

examples/gpt-oss/gpt-oss-20b-fft-fsdp2-offload.yaml

@@ -15,7 +15,7 @@ datasets:
     field_thinking: thinking
     template_thinking_key: thinking
 
-dataset_prepared_path: last_run_prepared
+dataset_prepared_path: ./outputs/last_run_prepared
 val_set_size: 0
 output_dir: ./outputs/gpt-oss-out/
 
@@ -41,7 +41,7 @@ bf16: true
 tf32: true
 
 flash_attention: true
-attn_implementation: kernels-community/vllm-flash-attn3
+attn_implementation: kernels-community/vllm-flash-attn3  # this is not needed if using flash_attn >= 2.8.3
 
 gradient_checkpointing: true
 activation_offloading: true

examples/gpt-oss/gpt-oss-20b-fft-fsdp2.yaml

@@ -15,7 +15,7 @@ datasets:
     field_thinking: thinking
     template_thinking_key: thinking
 
-dataset_prepared_path: last_run_prepared
+dataset_prepared_path: ./outputs/last_run_prepared
 val_set_size: 0
 output_dir: ./outputs/gpt-oss-out/
 
@@ -40,7 +40,7 @@ bf16: true
 tf32: true
 
 flash_attention: true
-attn_implementation: kernels-community/vllm-flash-attn3
+attn_implementation: kernels-community/vllm-flash-attn3  # this is not needed if using flash_attn >= 2.8.3
 
 gradient_checkpointing: true
 activation_offloading: true

examples/gpt-oss/gpt-oss-20b-sft-lora-singlegpu.yaml

@@ -53,7 +53,7 @@ bf16: true
 tf32: true
 
 flash_attention: true
-attn_implementation: kernels-community/vllm-flash-attn3
+attn_implementation: kernels-community/vllm-flash-attn3  # this is not needed if using flash_attn >= 2.8.3
 
 gradient_checkpointing: true
 activation_offloading: true

examples/hunyuan/README.md

@@ -0,0 +1,85 @@
+# Finetune HunYuan with Axolotl
+
+Tencent released a family of opensource models called HunYuan with varying parameter scales of 0.5B, 1.8B, 4B, and 7B scale for both Pre-trained and Instruct variants. The models can be found at [HuggingFace](https://huggingface.co/collections/tencent/hunyuan-dense-model-6890632cda26b19119c9c5e7). This guide shows how to fine-tune it with Axolotl with multi-turn conversations and proper masking.
+
+## Getting started
+
+1. Install Axolotl following the [installation guide](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/installation.html). You need to install from main as HunYuan is only on nightly or use our latest [Docker images](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/docker.html).
+
+    Here is an example of how to install from main for pip:
+
+```bash
+# Ensure you have Pytorch installed (Pytorch 2.6.0 min)
+git clone https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl.git
+cd axolotl
+
+uv sync
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
+
+# Install CCE https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/custom_integrations.html#cut-cross-entropy
+python scripts/cutcrossentropy_install.py | sh
+```
+
+2. Run the finetuning example:
+
+```bash
+axolotl train examples/hunyuan/hunyuan-v1-dense-qlora.yaml
+```
+
+This config uses about 4.7 GB VRAM.
+
+Let us know how it goes. Happy finetuning! 🚀
+
+### Dataset
+
+HunYuan Instruct models can choose to enter a slow think or fast think pattern. For best performance on fine-tuning their Instruct models, your dataset should be adjusted to match their pattern.
+
+```python
+# fast think pattern
+messages = [
+    {"role": "system", "content": "You are a helpful assistant."},
+    {"role": "user", "content": "/no_think What color is the sun?" },
+    {"role": "assistant", "content": "<think>\n\n</think>\n<answer>\nThe sun is yellow.\n</answer>"}
+]
+
+# slow think pattern
+messages = [
+    {"role": "system", "content": "You are a helpful assistant."},
+    {"role": "user", "content": "/no_think What color is the sun?" },
+    {"role": "assistant", "content": "<think>\nThe user is asking about the color of the sun. I need to ...\n</think>\n<answer>\nThe sun is yellow.\n</answer>"}
+]
+```
+
+### TIPS
+
+- For inference, the official Tencent team recommends
+
+```json
+
+{
+  "do_sample": true,
+  "top_k": 20,
+  "top_p": 0.8,
+  "repetition_penalty": 1.05,
+  "temperature": 0.7
+}
+
+```
+
+- You can run a full finetuning by removing the `adapter: qlora` and `load_in_4bit: true` from the config.
+- Read more on how to load your own dataset at [docs](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/dataset_loading.html).
+- The dataset format follows the OpenAI Messages format as seen [here](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/dataset-formats/conversation.html#chat_template).
+
+## Optimization Guides
+
+- [Multi-GPU Training](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/multi-gpu.html)
+- [Multi-Node Training](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/multi-node.html)
+- [LoRA Optimizations](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/lora_optims.html)
+
+## Related Resources
+
+- [Tencent HunYuan Blog](https://hunyuan.tencent.com/)
+- [Axolotl Docs](https://docs.axolotl.ai)
+- [Axolotl Website](https://axolotl.ai)
+- [Axolotl GitHub](https://github.com/axolotl-ai-cloud/axolotl)
+- [Axolotl Discord](https://discord.gg/7m9sfhzaf3)

examples/hunyuan/hunyuan-v1-dense-qlora.yaml

@@ -0,0 +1,64 @@
+base_model: tencent/Hunyuan-0.5B-Instruct
+
+# Automatically upload checkpoint and final model to HF
+# hub_model_id: username/custom_model_name
+
+plugins:
+  - axolotl.integrations.cut_cross_entropy.CutCrossEntropyPlugin
+
+load_in_8bit: false
+load_in_4bit: true
+
+datasets:
+  - path: fozziethebeat/alpaca_messages_2k_test
+    type: chat_template
+
+dataset_prepared_path: last_run_prepared
+val_set_size: 0.1
+output_dir: ./outputs/lora-out
+
+adapter: qlora
+lora_model_dir:
+
+sequence_len: 2048
+sample_packing: true
+
+lora_r: 32
+lora_alpha: 16
+lora_dropout: 0.05
+lora_target_linear: true
+lora_target_modules:
+  - gate_proj
+  - down_proj
+  - up_proj
+  - q_proj
+  - v_proj
+  - k_proj
+  - o_proj
+
+wandb_project:
+wandb_entity:
+wandb_watch:
+wandb_name:
+wandb_log_model:
+
+gradient_accumulation_steps: 4
+micro_batch_size: 2
+num_epochs: 1
+optimizer: adamw_bnb_8bit
+lr_scheduler: cosine
+learning_rate: 0.0002
+
+bf16: auto
+tf32: false
+
+gradient_checkpointing: true
+resume_from_checkpoint:
+logging_steps: 1
+flash_attention: true
+
+warmup_ratio: 0.1
+evals_per_epoch: 1
+saves_per_epoch: 1
+
+# save_first_step: true  # uncomment this to validate checkpoint saving works with your config

examples/llama-2/qlora-fsdp.yml

@@ -66,6 +66,7 @@ fsdp_config:
   fsdp_auto_wrap_policy: TRANSFORMER_BASED_WRAP
   fsdp_transformer_layer_cls_to_wrap: LlamaDecoderLayer
   fsdp_state_dict_type: FULL_STATE_DICT
+  # fsdp_cpu_offload_pin_memory: false  # uncomment to enable swap memory usage when RAM is insufficient
 special_tokens:
 
 # save_first_step: true  # uncomment this to validate checkpoint saving works with your config

examples/llama-3/3b-qat-fsdp2.yaml

@@ -15,20 +15,18 @@ liger_glu_activation: true
 liger_layer_norm: true
 liger_fused_linear_cross_entropy: true
 
+
 datasets:
   - path: yahma/alpaca-cleaned
     type: alpaca
+    split: train[:95%]
 
 output_dir: ./outputs/qat_out/
+dataset_prepared_path: ./outputs/qat_out/dataset_prepared
 
-sample_packing: true
-
-sequence_len: 512
-
-flex_attention: true
-flex_attn_compile_kwargs:
-  dynamic: false
-  mode: max-autotune-no-cudagraphs
+sample_packing: false
+sequence_len: 8192
+flash_attention: true
 
 qat:
   activation_dtype: int8
@@ -67,7 +65,7 @@ fsdp:
 fsdp_config:
   fsdp_version: 2
   fsdp_offload_params: false
-  fsdp_cpu_ram_efficient_loading: true
+  fsdp_cpu_ram_efficient_loading: false
   fsdp_auto_wrap_policy: TRANSFORMER_BASED_WRAP
   fsdp_transformer_layer_cls_to_wrap: LlamaDecoderLayer
   fsdp_state_dict_type: FULL_STATE_DICT
@@ -76,6 +74,6 @@ fsdp_config:
   fsdp_activation_checkpointing: true
 
 special_tokens:
-  pad_token: <|end_of_text|>
+  pad_token: <|finetune_right_pad_id|>
 
 # save_first_step: true  # uncomment this to validate checkpoint saving works with your config

examples/llama-3/3b-qat-nvfp4.yaml

@@ -0,0 +1,64 @@
+base_model: meta-llama/Llama-3.2-3B
+# Automatically upload checkpoint and final model to HF
+# hub_model_id: username/custom_model_name
+
+load_in_8bit: false
+load_in_4bit: false
+strict: false
+
+plugins:
+  - axolotl.integrations.liger.LigerPlugin
+
+liger_rope: true
+liger_rms_norm: true
+liger_glu_activation: true
+liger_layer_norm: true
+liger_fused_linear_cross_entropy: true
+
+datasets:
+  - path: yahma/alpaca-cleaned
+    type: alpaca
+    split: train[:95%]
+
+output_dir: ./outputs/qat_out/
+dataset_prepared_path: ./outputs/dataset_prepared
+
+sequence_len: 8192
+flash_attention: true
+
+qat:
+  activation_dtype: nvfp4
+  weight_dtype: nvfp4
+  group_size: 16 # only group_size of 16 is supported with nvfp4
+
+wandb_project:
+wandb_entity:
+wandb_watch:
+wandb_name:
+wandb_log_model:
+
+gradient_checkpointing: true
+gradient_accumulation_steps: 1
+micro_batch_size: 64
+num_epochs: 1
+optimizer: adamw_torch_fused
+
+cosine_constant_lr_ratio: 0
+cosine_min_lr_ratio: 1.0
+learning_rate: 2e-5
+save_only_model: true
+bf16: true
+
+resume_from_checkpoint:
+logging_steps: 1
+
+evals_per_epoch: 1
+saves_per_epoch: 1
+
+warmup_ratio: 0.1
+weight_decay: 0.0
+
+special_tokens:
+  pad_token: <|finetune_right_pad_id|>
+
+# save_first_step: true  # uncomment this to validate checkpoint saving works with your config

examples/llama-3/diffusion/pretrain-1b.yaml

@@ -9,15 +9,18 @@ pretraining_dataset:
     field: text
 
 plugins:
-  - diffusion.DiffusionPlugin
-noise_schedule: cosine
-min_mask_ratio: 0.15
-max_mask_ratio: 0.85
-eps: 5e-4
-importance_weighting: true
-mask_token_id: 128002
-generate_samples: true
-generation_interval: 10
+  - axolotl.integrations.diffusion.DiffusionPlugin
+
+diffusion:
+  noise_schedule: cosine
+  min_mask_ratio: 0.15
+  max_mask_ratio: 0.85
+  num_diffusion_steps: 128
+  eps: 5e-4
+  importance_weighting: true
+  mask_token_id: 128002
+  generate_samples: true
+  generation_interval: 250
 
 output_dir: ./outputs/model-out
 
@@ -27,21 +30,17 @@ sample_packing: true
 gradient_accumulation_steps: 8
 micro_batch_size: 4
 max_steps: 10000
+warmup_ratio: 0.1
 
 optimizer: adamw_8bit
 lr_scheduler: cosine
 learning_rate: 3e-4
+sdp_attention: true
 
 bf16: auto
 tf32: true
 
-gradient_checkpointing: true
-resume_from_checkpoint:
 logging_steps: 1
-sdp_attention: true
-
-warmup_steps: 1000
-
 save_strategy: steps
 save_steps: 1000
 

examples/llama-3/diffusion/sft-1b.yaml

@@ -8,14 +8,18 @@ datasets:
 val_set_size: 0.05
 
 plugins:
-  - diffusion.DiffusionPlugin
-noise_schedule: cosine
-min_mask_ratio: 0.1
-max_mask_ratio: 0.9
-num_diffusion_steps: 128
-eps: 1e-3
-importance_weighting: true
-mask_token_id: 128002
+  - axolotl.integrations.diffusion.DiffusionPlugin
+
+diffusion:
+  noise_schedule: cosine
+  min_mask_ratio: 0.1
+  max_mask_ratio: 0.9
+  num_diffusion_steps: 128
+  eps: 1e-3
+  importance_weighting: true
+  mask_token_id: 128002
+  generate_samples: true
+  generation_interval: 250
 
 output_dir: ./outputs/model-out
 
@@ -26,6 +30,7 @@ eval_sample_packing: true
 gradient_accumulation_steps: 4
 micro_batch_size: 4
 num_epochs: 1
+warmup_steps: 0.1
 
 optimizer: adamw_8bit
 lr_scheduler: cosine
@@ -36,15 +41,11 @@ tf32: true
 
 gradient_checkpointing: true
 resume_from_checkpoint:
-logging_steps: 1
 sdp_attention: true
 
-warmup_steps: 1000
-
-save_strategy: steps
-eval_strategy: steps
-save_steps: 500
-eval_steps: 500
+logging_steps: 1
+save_strategy: best
+eval_strategy: epoch
 
 special_tokens:
   pad_token: "<|end_of_text|>"

examples/llama-3/instruct-lora-8b.yml

@@ -12,15 +12,6 @@ chat_template: llama3
 datasets:
   - path: fozziethebeat/alpaca_messages_2k_test
     type: chat_template
-    field_messages: messages
-    message_property_mappings:
-      role: role
-      content: content
-    roles:
-      user:
-        - user
-      assistant:
-        - assistant
 
 dataset_prepared_path:
 val_set_size: 0.05

examples/llama-4/do-no-use-fa2/scout-vision-qlora-fsdp.yaml

@@ -46,7 +46,6 @@ datasets:
   - path: HuggingFaceH4/llava-instruct-mix-vsft
     type: chat_template
     split: train[:1%]
-    field_messages: messages
 
 dataset_prepared_path: last_run_prepared
 val_set_size: 0.0

examples/llama-4/scout-vision-qlora-fsdp2-flex.yaml

@@ -45,7 +45,6 @@ datasets:
   - path: HuggingFaceH4/llava-instruct-mix-vsft
     type: chat_template
     split: train[:1%]
-    field_messages: messages
 
 dataset_prepared_path: last_run_prepared
 val_set_size: 0.0

examples/magistral/README.md

@@ -1,10 +1,10 @@
 # Finetune Magistral Small with Axolotl
 
-Magistral Small is a 24B parameter opensource model from MistralAI found on HuggingFace at [2506](https://huggingface.co/mistralai/Magistral-Small-2506) and [2507](https://huggingface.co/mistralai/Magistral-Small-2507) (see [Thinking](#thinking)). This guide shows how to fine-tune it with Axolotl with multi-turn conversations and proper masking.
+Magistral Small is a 24B parameter opensource model from MistralAI found on HuggingFace at [2506](https://huggingface.co/mistralai/Magistral-Small-2506), [2507](https://huggingface.co/mistralai/Magistral-Small-2507) (see [Thinking](#thinking)), and [2509](https://huggingface.co/mistralai/Magistral-Small-2509) (see [Vision](#vision)). This guide shows how to fine-tune it with Axolotl with multi-turn conversations and proper masking.
 
 MistralAI has also released a proprietary medium-sized version called Magistral Medium.
 
-Thanks to the team at MistralAI for giving us early access to prepare for this release.
+Thanks to the team at MistralAI for giving us early access to prepare for these releases.
 
 ## Getting started
 
@@ -13,12 +13,23 @@ Thanks to the team at MistralAI for giving us early access to prepare for this r
     Here is an example of how to install from pip:
 
 ```bash
-# Ensure you have Pytorch installed (Pytorch 2.6.0 min)
-pip3 install packaging==23.2 setuptools==75.8.0 wheel ninja
-pip3 install --no-build-isolation 'axolotl[flash-attn]>=0.12.0'
+# Ensure you have PyTorch installed (PyTorch 2.6.0 min)
+# Option A: manage dependencies in your project
+uv add 'axolotl>=0.12.0'
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
+
+# Option B: quick install
+uv pip install 'axolotl>=0.12.0'
+uv pip install flash-attn --no-build-isolation
 ```
 
-2. Run the finetuning example:
+2. Install [Cut Cross Entropy](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/custom_integrations.html#cut-cross-entropy) to reduce training VRAM usage
+
+```bash
+python scripts/cutcrossentropy_install.py | sh
+```
+
+3. Run the finetuning example:
 
 ```bash
 axolotl train examples/magistral/magistral-small-qlora.yaml
@@ -30,29 +41,17 @@ Let us know how it goes. Happy finetuning! 🚀
 
 ### Thinking
 
-MistralAI has released their [2507](https://huggingface.co/mistralai/Magistral-Small-2507) model with thinking capabilities. The model requires the multi-content dataset format with support for an extra `role: thinking` within system and assistant messages.
+MistralAI has released their [2507](https://huggingface.co/mistralai/Magistral-Small-2507) model with thinking capabilities, enabling Chain-of-Thought reasoning with explicit thinking steps.
 
-Example format:
+📚 **[See the Thinking fine-tuning guide →](./think/README.md)**
 
-```json
-{
-    "messages": [
-        {"role": "system", "content": [{ "type": "text", "text": "{SYSTEM_PROMPT}"}]},
-        {"role": "user", "content": [{ "type": "text", "text": "..."}]},
-        {"role": "assistant", "content": [{ "type": "thinking", "thinking": "..."}, { "type": "text", "text": "..." }]},
-    ],
-}
-```
+### Vision
 
-Example config: `./magistral-small-think-qlora.yaml`.
+MistralAI has released their [2509](https://huggingface.co/mistralai/Magistral-Small-2509) model with vision capabilities.
 
-The `thinking` section also supports an optional arg `closed: bool` (`True` default) which controls adding the closing `[/THINK]` tag.
+📚 **[See the Vision fine-tuning guide →](./vision/README.md)**
 
-Limitations:
-- You cannot mix `content: str` with `content: list[dict]` as the `dataset.load_dataset` may complain about different types for `content` key.
-- This mode does not work with custom `train_detail` and `training` at the moment.
-
-### TIPS
+### Tips
 
 - We recommend adding the same/similar SystemPrompt that the model is tuned for. You can find this within the repo's files titled `SYSTEM_PROMPT.txt`.
 - For inference, the official MistralAI team recommends `top_p: 0.95` and `temperature: 0.7` with `max_tokens: 40960`.
@@ -83,5 +82,5 @@ In addition, we do not support overriding tokens yet.
 
 ## Future Work
 
-- Add parity to Preference Tuning, RL, Multi-modal, etc.
+- Add parity to Preference Tuning, RL, etc.
 - Add parity to other tokenizer configs like overriding tokens.

examples/magistral/think/README.md

@@ -0,0 +1,73 @@
+# Magistral Small Thinking Fine-tuning
+
+This guide covers fine-tuning [Magistral Small 2507](https://huggingface.co/mistralai/Magistral-Small-2507) with thinking capabilities using Axolotl. The thinking model enables explicit Chain-of-Thought reasoning with separate thinking and response sections.
+
+## Prerequisites
+
+Before starting, ensure you have:
+- Installed Axolotl (see [main README](../README.md))
+
+## Getting Started
+
+Run the thinking model fine-tuning:
+
+```bash
+axolotl train magistral-small-think-qlora.yaml
+```
+
+This config uses about 19.1 GiB VRAM.
+
+### Tips
+
+- Dataset uses multi-content format with `type: thinking` support. See [Dataset Format](#dataset-format) below.
+- You cannot mix `content: str` and `content: list[dict]`, otherwise, dataset loading will fail. Keep it consistent.
+
+## Dataset Format
+
+The thinking model requires the multi-content dataset format with support for an extra `role: thinking` within system and assistant messages.
+
+Example format:
+
+```json
+{
+    "messages": [
+        {
+            "role": "system",
+            "content": [
+                { "type": "text", "text": "{SYSTEM_PROMPT}"}
+            ]
+        },
+        {
+            "role": "user",
+            "content": [
+                { "type": "text", "text": "Solve this step by step: What is 15% of 240?"}
+            ]
+        },
+        {
+            "role": "assistant",
+            "content": [
+                {
+                    "type": "thinking",
+                    "thinking": "I need to calculate 15% of 240. First, I'll convert 15% to decimal: 0.15. Then multiply: 0.15 × 240 = 36."
+                },
+                {
+                    "type": "text",
+                    "text": "To find 15% of 240, I'll multiply 240 by 0.15:\n\n240 × 0.15 = 36\n\nTherefore, 15% of 240 is 36."
+                }
+            ]
+        }
+    ]
+}
+```
+
+### Advanced Options
+
+The `thinking` section supports an optional `closed` parameter:
+
+```json
+{
+    "type": "thinking",
+    "thinking": "Internal reasoning here...",
+    "closed": true  // Default: true, controls adding the closing [/THINK] tag
+}
+```

examples/magistral/vision/README.md

@@ -0,0 +1,60 @@
+# Magistral Small Vision Fine-tuning
+
+This guide covers fine-tuning [Magistral Small 2509](https://huggingface.co/mistralai/Magistral-Small-2509) with vision capabilities using Axolotl.
+
+## Prerequisites
+
+Before starting, ensure you have:
+- Installed Axolotl from source (see [main README](../README.md#getting-started))
+
+## Getting started
+
+1. Install the required vision lib:
+    ```bash
+    pip install 'mistral-common[opencv]==1.8.5'
+    ```
+
+2. Download the example dataset image:
+   ```bash
+   wget https://huggingface.co/datasets/Nanobit/text-vision-2k-test/resolve/main/African_elephant.jpg
+   ```
+
+3. Run the fine-tuning:
+   ```bash
+   axolotl train magistral-small-vision-24B-qlora.yml
+   ```
+
+This config uses about 17GiB VRAM.
+
+WARNING: The loss and grad norm will be much higher than normal at first. We suspect this to be inherent to the model as of the moment. If anyone would like to submit a fix for this, we are happy to take a look.
+
+### Tips
+
+Key differences from text-only model:
+- `max_tokens: 131072` for inference
+- Multi-modal dataset format required
+- Sample packing not supported
+
+## Dataset Format
+
+The vision model requires multi-modal dataset format as documented [here](https://docs.axolotl.ai/docs/multimodal.html#dataset-format).
+
+One exception is that, passing `"image": PIL.Image` is not supported. MistralTokenizer only supports `path`, `url`, and `base64` for now.
+
+Example:
+```json
+{
+    "messages": [
+        {"role": "system", "content": [{ "type": "text", "text": "{SYSTEM_PROMPT}"}]},
+        {"role": "user", "content": [
+            { "type": "text", "text": "What's in this image?"},
+            {"type": "image", "path": "path/to/image.jpg" }
+        ]},
+        {"role": "assistant", "content": [{ "type": "text", "text": "..." }]},
+    ],
+}
+```
+
+## Limitations
+
+- Sample Packing is not supported for multi-modality training currently.

examples/magistral/vision/magistral-small-vision-24B-qlora.yml

@@ -0,0 +1,64 @@
+base_model: mistralai/Magistral-Small-2509
+processor_type: AutoProcessor
+
+# Enable to use mistral-common tokenizer
+tokenizer_use_mistral_common: true
+
+plugins:
+  - axolotl.integrations.cut_cross_entropy.CutCrossEntropyPlugin
+
+load_in_4bit: true
+
+# these 3 lines are needed for now to handle vision chat templates w images
+skip_prepare_dataset: true
+remove_unused_columns: false
+sample_packing: false
+
+# sample dataset below requires downloading image in advance
+# wget https://huggingface.co/datasets/Nanobit/text-vision-2k-test/resolve/main/African_elephant.jpg
+datasets:
+  - path: Nanobit/text-vision-2k-test
+    type: chat_template
+
+dataset_prepared_path: last_run_prepared
+val_set_size: 0.01
+output_dir: ./outputs/out
+
+adapter: qlora
+lora_model_dir:
+
+sequence_len: 2048
+
+lora_r: 32
+lora_alpha: 16
+lora_dropout: 0.05
+lora_target_modules: 'model.language_model.layers.[\d]+.(mlp|cross_attn|self_attn).(up|down|gate|q|k|v|o)_proj'
+
+wandb_project:
+wandb_entity:
+wandb_watch:
+wandb_name:
+wandb_log_model:
+
+gradient_accumulation_steps: 1
+micro_batch_size: 1
+num_epochs: 1
+optimizer: adamw_bnb_8bit
+lr_scheduler: cosine
+learning_rate: 0.0002
+
+bf16: true
+fp16:
+tf32: true
+
+gradient_checkpointing: true
+logging_steps: 1
+flash_attention: true
+
+warmup_ratio: 0.1
+evals_per_epoch: 1
+saves_per_epoch: 1
+weight_decay: 0.0
+special_tokens:
+
+# save_first_step: true  # uncomment this to validate checkpoint saving works with your config

examples/mistral/mistral-small/mistral-small-3.1-24B-lora.yml

@@ -1,6 +1,9 @@
 base_model: mistralai/Mistral-Small-3.1-24B-Instruct-2503
 processor_type: AutoProcessor
 
+# Enable to use mistral-common tokenizer
+tokenizer_use_mistral_common: true
+
 load_in_8bit: true
 
 # these 3 lines are needed for now to handle vision chat templates w images
@@ -8,12 +11,12 @@ skip_prepare_dataset: true
 remove_unused_columns: false
 sample_packing: false
 
-chat_template: mistral_v7_tekken
+# sample dataset below requires downloading image in advance
+# wget https://huggingface.co/datasets/Nanobit/text-vision-2k-test/resolve/main/African_elephant.jpg
 datasets:
-  - path: HuggingFaceH4/llava-instruct-mix-vsft
+  - path: Nanobit/text-vision-2k-test
     type: chat_template
-    split: train[:1%]
-    field_messages: messages
+
 dataset_prepared_path: last_run_prepared
 val_set_size: 0.01
 output_dir: ./outputs/out
@@ -48,8 +51,7 @@ tf32: true
 
 gradient_checkpointing: true
 logging_steps: 1
-# flash_attention: false # PixtralVisionModel does not support Flash Attention 2.0 yet.
-sdp_attention: true
+flash_attention: true
 
 warmup_ratio: 0.1
 evals_per_epoch: 1

examples/phi/lora-3.5.yaml

@@ -12,15 +12,6 @@ chat_template: phi_3
 datasets:
   - path: fozziethebeat/alpaca_messages_2k_test
     type: chat_template
-    field_messages: messages
-    message_property_mappings:
-      role: role
-      content: content
-    roles:
-      user:
-        - user
-      assistant:
-        - assistant
 
 dataset_prepared_path:
 val_set_size: 0.05

examples/pixtral/lora-12b.yml

@@ -45,8 +45,7 @@ tf32: true
 
 gradient_checkpointing: true
 logging_steps: 1
-# flash_attention:  # PixtralVisionModel does not support Flash Attention 2.0 yet
-sdp_attention: true
+flash_attention: true
 
 warmup_ratio: 0.1
 evals_per_epoch: 1

examples/qwen2-vl/lora-7b.yaml

@@ -11,7 +11,7 @@ datasets:
   - path: HuggingFaceH4/llava-instruct-mix-vsft
     type: chat_template
     split: train[:1%]
-    field_messages: messages
+
 dataset_prepared_path: last_run_prepared
 val_set_size: 0.0
 output_dir: ./outputs/out