Maven - Fine-Tuning Open-Weight LLMs for Engineers
File Name: Maven - Fine-Tuning Open-Weight LLMs for Engineers Content Source: https://maven.com/dvgodoy/finetuning Genre / Category: Courses for Developers Language: ENGLISH Original Price: $597 What you'll learn: This practical course on fine-tuning LLM with open weights will help engineers master the full cycle of fine-tuning large language models: from task selection and dataset preparation to LoRA/QLoRA tuning , quality assessment, and application of the results in real-world projects. About the courseMost materials on fine-tuning large language models are either overly theoretical or designed for large teams, large datasets, and expensive computing infrastructure. In practice, a more accessible and reproducible approach suffices for many engineering problems. This course focuses on efficient retraining of open-weight LLMs using modern parameter-efficient learning methods: LoRA and QLoRA . You'll learn how to select a suitable task, prepare a specialized dataset, train an adapter on available hardware, and objectively evaluate the results. The main goal of the course is to understand when fine-tuning is truly justified: it helps improve response quality, reduce costs, decrease latency, achieve a stable output format, or reduce dependence on commercial APIs. The training takes the form of a practical workshop with a small group of participants. This allows participants to discuss their own projects, receive feedback from the instructor, and explore real-world limitations related to data, models, and computing resources. What you will learnSelect tasks for further LLM trainingDetermine when to use fine-tuning and when Prompt Engineering, RAG, or input data enhancement is sufficient. Evaluate tasks based on repeatability, result requirements, data availability, verification complexity, and implementation cost. Translate broad business problems into specific scenarios suitable for model training. For example, instead of the general task of “answering customer questions,” formulate a more precise task: classifying requests by category, urgency, or other parameters. Use a system of criteria to make an informed decision about the feasibility of fine-tuning LLM. Prepare datasets for fine-tuningCreate specialized data sets for specific tasks. Bring training examples to a unified structure Instruction / Input / Output. Identify ambiguous, contradictory and uninformative examples. Clean, normalize, and structure data before training. Improve the quality of the training sample without having to collect huge amounts of data. Retrain models using LoRA and QLoRALoad base language models with open weights in a Jupyter Notebook environment. Understand the principles of parameter-efficient feasibility training (PEFT). Configure key LoRA and QLoRA parameters: Target Modules — target modules of the model. Rank — adapter rank. Learning Rate — learning speed. Batch Size —batch size. Sequence Length — the length of the sequence. Conduct a full training cycle using available computing resources. Save trained adapters for further testing and use. Evaluate the quality of the retrained modelCompare the results of the base and retrained LLM. Create separate test datasets that were not used in training. Assess the accuracy of task completion, adherence to the response format, and the stability of the model's behavior. Analyze typical mistakes and find patterns in unsuccessful results. Determine whether retraining has produced real improvements over the original model. Diagnose problems and improve resultsFind the reasons for unsatisfactory fine-tuning results. Identify issues with data labeling, problem definition, and test sample quality. Understand when to change hyperparameters, choose a different model, or revise the dataset structure. Recognize common mistakes when training on small datasets. Decide on your next steps: continue learning, collect additional samples, use RAG, or abandon fine-tuning. Apply fine-tuning to your own projectsUse a ready-made Jupyter Notebook for data preparation, training, inference, and model evaluation. Adapt the fine-tuning process to your own tasks and data sets. Apply pre-trained models for classification, data mining, and query routing. Configure the generation of structured responses and adaptation of text style. Design reproducible experiments to test different models and approaches. Assess potential resource savings and reduced dependence on proprietary LLMs. What will you get as a result?By the end of the course, you will have practical artifacts that you can use as a basis for your own experiments and work projects. A prepared dataset is a cleaned and structured data set for a specific task. The trained LoRA/QLoRA adapter is the result of practical retraining of a language model with open weights. Comparative evaluation of models - test results before and after fine-tuning. A reusable Jupyter Notebook is a ready-to-use workflow for data preparation, training, inference, and evaluation. The Decision Checklist is a system of criteria that helps determine when retraining is justified and when it is more effective to use prompting, RAG, or improving the initial data. Who is this course for?This course is suitable for developers, ML engineers, AI engineers, data scientists, and technical managers who want to gain practical experience in retraining large language models without the need for expensive infrastructure. It is especially useful for those who already work with LLM via the API but want to move to models with open weights, gain more control over their behavior, and learn how to adapt models to specialized tasks. For developers who implement LLM in products and internal tools. For ML and AI engineers who need a practical fine-tuning pipeline. Data scientists working with classification, data extraction, and structured responses. Technical managers who want to evaluate the feasibility of additional LLM training for business needs. What tasks can be solved after the course?Classification of text messages, documents and messages. Extracting structured information from unstructured text. Routing requests by category, priority, or responsible teams. Generating responses in a given format. Adapting the model's style to the internal requirements of the product or company. Comparing fine-tuning, RAG, and prompt engineering to select the optimal approach. PrerequisitesTo successfully complete the course, it is recommended to have basic Python programming experience and a general understanding of the LLM. In-depth research background in machine learning is not required: the emphasis is on practical processes, engineering solutions, and reproducible experiments. Final learning outcomeAfter the course, you will be able to independently conduct a full cycle of fine-tuning LLM: select a suitable task, prepare a dataset, train a LoRA/QLoRA adapter, compare the quality of the baseline and fine-tuned models, and make an informed decision about applying the results to a real project.
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S A N
Submitted 10/27/2026
Category Paid Coding Courses
Sale page https://maven.com/dvgodoy/finetuning
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