sampling : optimize samplers by reusing bucket sort (#15665)

* sampling : optimize sorting using bucket sort in more places

ggml-ci

* sampling : do not sort in dist sampler

ggml-ci

* sampling : avoid heap allocations for sort buffers

ggml-ci

* common : add option to sort sampling candidates by probability

ggml-ci

* sampling : revert the change for preserving sort buffers

* sampling : use std::copy instead of memcpy

* sampling : clarify purpose of partial sort helpers

ggml-ci

* cont : remove wrong comment [no ci]

* common : update comment

Co-authored-by: Johannes Gäßler <johannesg@5d6.de>

---------

Co-authored-by: Johannes Gäßler <johannesg@5d6.de>

Author: ggerganov

common/sampling.cpp

@@ -426,8 +426,29 @@ uint32_t common_sampler_get_seed(const struct common_sampler * gsmpl) {
 
 // helpers
 
-llama_token_data_array * common_sampler_get_candidates(struct common_sampler * gsmpl) {
-    return &gsmpl->cur_p;
+llama_token_data_array * common_sampler_get_candidates(struct common_sampler * gsmpl, bool do_sort) {
+    auto * res = &gsmpl->cur_p;
+
+    if (do_sort && !res->sorted) {
+        // remember the selected token before sorting
+        const llama_token id = res->data[res->selected].id;
+
+        std::sort(res->data, res->data + res->size, [](const llama_token_data & a, const llama_token_data & b) {
+            return a.p > b.p;
+        });
+
+        // restore the selected token after sorting
+        for (size_t i = 0; i < res->size; ++i) {
+            if (res->data[i].id == id) {
+                res->selected = i;
+                break;
+            }
+        }
+
+        res->sorted = true;
+    }
+
+    return res;
 }
 
 llama_token common_sampler_last(const struct common_sampler * gsmpl) {

common/sampling.h

@@ -86,7 +86,9 @@ uint32_t common_sampler_get_seed(const struct common_sampler * gsmpl);
 // helpers
 
 // access the internal list of current candidate tokens
-llama_token_data_array * common_sampler_get_candidates(struct common_sampler * gsmpl);
+// if do_sort == true, the candidates are guaranteed to be sorted afterwards (in descending order of probability)
+// the .sorted flag of the result indicates whether the returned candidates are sorted
+llama_token_data_array * common_sampler_get_candidates(struct common_sampler * gsmpl, bool do_sort);
 
 // get the last accepted token
 llama_token common_sampler_last(const struct common_sampler * gsmpl);

common/speculative.cpp

@@ -317,7 +317,7 @@ llama_tokens common_speculative_gen_draft(
 
         common_sampler_sample(smpl, ctx_dft, 0, true);
 
-        const auto * cur_p = common_sampler_get_candidates(smpl);
+        const auto * cur_p = common_sampler_get_candidates(smpl, true);
 
         for (int k = 0; k < std::min(3, (int) cur_p->size); ++k) {
             LOG_DBG(" - draft candidate %3d, pos %3d: %6d (%8.3f) '%s'\n",

examples/speculative/speculative.cpp

@@ -244,7 +244,7 @@ int main(int argc, char ** argv) {
                     // stochastic verification
                     common_sampler_sample(smpl, ctx_tgt, drafts[s_keep].i_batch_tgt[i_dft], true);
 
-                    auto & dist_tgt = *common_sampler_get_candidates(smpl);
+                    auto & dist_tgt = *common_sampler_get_candidates(smpl, true);
 
                     float p_tgt = 0.0f;
                     float p_dft = 0.0f;
@@ -493,7 +493,7 @@ int main(int argc, char ** argv) {
 
                 common_sampler_sample(drafts[s].smpl, ctx_dft, drafts[s].i_batch_dft, true);
 
-                const auto * cur_p = common_sampler_get_candidates(drafts[s].smpl);
+                const auto * cur_p = common_sampler_get_candidates(drafts[s].smpl, true);
 
                 for (int k = 0; k < std::min(n_seq_dft + 3, (int) cur_p->size); ++k) {
                     LOG_DBG(" - draft candidate %3d for seq %3d, pos %3d: %6d (%8.3f) '%s'\n",

include/llama.h

@@ -206,7 +206,7 @@ extern "C" {
         llama_token_data * data;
         size_t size;
         int64_t selected; // this is the index in the data array (i.e. not the token id)
-        bool sorted;
+        bool sorted;      // note: do not assume the data is sorted - always check this flag
     } llama_token_data_array;
 
     typedef bool (*llama_progress_callback)(float progress, void * user_data);
@@ -1156,11 +1156,6 @@ extern "C" {
     LLAMA_API struct llama_sampler * llama_sampler_init_greedy(void);
     LLAMA_API struct llama_sampler * llama_sampler_init_dist  (uint32_t seed);
 
-    /// @details Sorts candidate tokens by their logits in descending order and calculate probabilities based on logits.
-    /// NOTE: Avoid using on the full vocabulary as the sorting can become slow. For example, apply top-k or top-p sampling first.
-    DEPRECATED(LLAMA_API struct llama_sampler * llama_sampler_init_softmax    (void),
-        "will be removed in the future (see https://github.com/ggml-org/llama.cpp/pull/9896#discussion_r1800920915)");
-
     /// @details Top-K sampling described in academic paper "The Curious Case of Neural Text Degeneration" https://arxiv.org/abs/1904.09751
     /// Setting k <= 0 makes this a noop
     LLAMA_API struct llama_sampler * llama_sampler_init_top_k      (int32_t k);