The conda package specification includes the package name (i.e. singa), version and build string (could be very long). To install a certain SINGA package we run

conda install -c nusdbsystem singa=<version>=<build string>

It is inconvenient to type all 3 parts when running the installation commands. The meta.yml file in this folder is to create a conda package singa-dist as an alias of one specific SINGA package. It does nothing except creating a dummy conda package that depends on one real gpu version SINGA package. For example, the following line in meta.yml indicates that singa-gpu depends on SINGA with version 1.1.1, python version=3.6, cuda version=9, cudnn version = 7.1.2, nccl version = 2.4.8.1, and mpich version = 3.3.2

- singa 1.1.1 py36_cuda9.0_cudnn7.1.2_nccl2.4.8.1_mpich3.3.2

Therefore, when we run

conda install -c nusdbsystem singa-dist

The dependent SINGA package will be installed. By default, singa-dist depends on the latest SINGA (py3.6) on the latest cuda (and cudnn), as well as the distributed computing libraries nccl and mpich. When we have a new SINGA version available, we need to update the meta.yml file to change the dependency.

To build this package and upload it

conda config --add channels nusdbsystem
conda-build .  --python 3.6
anaconda -t $ANACONDA_UPLOAD_TOKEN upload -u nusdbsystem -l main <path to the singa-dist package>

where $ANACONDA_UPLOAD_TOKEN is the upload token associated with nusdbsystem account on anaconda cloud.