Comparing Julia and Python : An investigation of the performance on image processing with deep neural networks and classification

Abstract: Python is the most popular language when it comes to prototyping and developing machine learning algorithms. Python is an interpreted language that causes it to have a significant performance loss compared to compiled languages. Julia is a newly developed language that tries to bridge the gap between high performance but cumbersome languages such as C++ and highly abstracted but typically slow languages such as Python. However, over the years, the Python community have developed a lot of tools that addresses its performance problems. This raises the question if choosing one language over the other has any significant performance difference. This thesis compares the performance, in terms of execution time, of the two languages in the machine learning domain. More specifically, image processing with GPU-accelerated deep neural networks and classification with k-nearest neighbor on the MNIST and EMNIST dataset. Python with Keras and Tensorflow is compared against Julia with Flux for GPU-accelerated neural networks. For classification Python with Scikit-learn is compared against Julia with Nearestneighbors.jl. The results point in the direction that Julia has a performance edge in regards to GPU-accelerated deep neural networks. With Julia outperforming Python by roughly 1.25x − 1.5x. For classification with k-nearest neighbor the results were a bit more varied with Julia outperforming Python in 5 out of 8 different measurements. However, there exists some validity threats and additional research is needed that includes all different frameworks available for the languages in order to provide a more conclusive and generalized answer.