Causes of 'InvalidArgumentError: indices[0] = -1 is not in [0, ...)' in TensorFlow
- Invalid Index Access: One of the most common causes of this error is attempting to access an element in a tensor using an index that is out of bounds. In TensorFlow, tensors are zero-indexed and do not support negative indices for accessing elements. When an operation attempts to use such an index, it results in an InvalidArgumentError.
- Usage of -1 in Incompatible Contexts: In many TensorFlow operations, using -1 is a common way to indicate a flexible dimension or to reshape a tensor by inferring its size. However, using -1 as an actual index in contexts where only non-negative indices are valid, such as tf.gather or tf.scatter\_nd, will trigger an InvalidArgumentError.
- Data Preprocessing Errors: Errors in data preprocessing steps can lead to unintended -1 indices. For example, applying operations like subtracting a specific value from all elements in an array without proper handling can result in negative indices that are passed to subsequent TensorFlow operations.
- Batching or Padding Issues: When batching or padding sequences of different lengths without proper handling, it's possible to introduce -1 as an explicit index. If these sequences are used directly in TensorFlow operations expecting non-negative indices, the error will occur.
- Incorrect Label Encoding: In classification tasks, misconfigurations during label encoding, where labels might inadvertently be assigned a value of -1, can cause TensorFlow functions that expect indices (like embedding lookups) to throw this error.
import tensorflow as tf
# Example of TensorFlow operation that might raise the error
# Suppose labels have incorrect encoding
labels = tf.constant([-1, 2, 3], dtype=tf.int32)
embeddings = tf.constant([[0.1, 0.2], [0.3, 0.4], [0.5, 0.6]], dtype=tf.float32)
# Attempting to gather embeddings for given labels
# This will cause InvalidArgumentError: indices[0] = -1 is not in [0, 3)
try:
tf.nn.embedding_lookup(embeddings, labels)
except tf.errors.InvalidArgumentError as e:
print(e)
