Want to build skills in artificial intelligence (A.I.) and deep learning? Udacity and Google are launching a free introductory course on the subject, which naturally leans into TensorFlow, the open-source library for deep learning software developed by Google. “Intro to TensorFlow for Deep Learning” is a two-month course, and now open to enrollment. Its goal is to help developers build A.I. applications that can scale (using TensorFlow, of course). It’s the second TensorFlow-based collaboration between the two firms; in 2016, Udacity and Google launched a TesnorFlow course that taught students the basics of the platform. The launch of this new course coincides with the release of TensorFlow 2.0 alpha, which Udacity says is “a major milestone and has been redesigned with a focus on simplicity, developer productivity, and ease of use" (and uses a lot more Keras). By honing in on the Keras API, Google was able to strip out a bunch of redundant or deprecated APIs to make life simpler for A.I. and machine learning use-cases. This new course is part of Udacity’s ‘School of A.I.,’ a set of free courses to help those new to A.I. and machine learning get up to speed. “Our catalog covers a huge range of topics such as linear algebra and calculus, foundational machine learning models, and state-of-the-art deep learning,” writes Udacity. “You’ll also be able to gain skills in domains such as computer vision, natural language processing, and deep reinforcement learning. “ "Artificial intelligence" may be one of those tech terms you hear tossed around loosely, but it’s not baseless. It sits within the top 20 best-paying skills on the most recent Dice Salary Survey, with an average income of $120,709 annually. That’s well above the tech pro median annual salary of $93,244. Machine Learning isn’t far behind; it earns tech pros $113,093 per year, on average. Earlier this year, we examined the top skills in job postings across Dice, and found TesnorFlow and Keras were gaining steam. From our post:

We should also note that, as raw tech skills go, TensorFlow is leading the charge for machine learning. It also seems to be contributing to the popularity of Keras; though not as popular as TensorFlow, Keras’ popularity rises and falls in alignment with TensorFlow. GraphQL and Automation Anywhere are proving useful for bringing bots and APIs to more users, too.

Enrollment for Udacity’s latest course is open, though we’re not sure if it’s limited in class size. If you need to learn skills quickly, many of Udacity’s courses are open to a faster pace, so the two-month timeline is likely a suggestion.