---name: aws-ai-mldescription: >metadata: version: 4---

AWS AI/ML Model Customization

Domain expertise for fine-tuning and deploying models on Amazon SageMaker. Covers the full model customization lifecycle from planning through production deployment.

Routing

Match the user's intent to the appropriate reference folder and load only that content.

User intent	Reference	When to use
Plan a model customization project, discover scope of work, resume or modify a plan	references/planning/	User's request relates to model customization or deployment (fine-tuning, training, building, customizing, reviewing data, deploying or standing up a model — including selecting or deploying an off-the-shelf or base model with no training — or getting advice on approach). Always co-activate with other intents to discover full scope. Load this reference FIRST when the request matches multiple rows in this table — read its plan templates before routing to a single-action reference.
Define the business problem, success criteria, or use case spec	references/use-case-specification/	User says "define my use case", "capture requirements", "what should I decide up front", or as default first step in any plan. Skip only if user explicitly declines.
Select or change a base model	references/model-selection/	User asks which model to use, mentions a model name or family, or wants to evaluate what's available. Always activate model-selection even for known model names because the exact Hub model ID must be resolved. Recommended: route to use-case-specification first to capture requirements — this produces better filtering results. Routing to use-case-specification first is not required if user provides a specific model name/ID or declines. If intent is ambiguous (fine-tune vs deploy as-is), model-selection MUST confirm which path before proceeding. Base model filtering for deployment MUST go through select-for-deployment.md and its scripts for any final recommendation.
Choose a fine-tuning technique (SFT, DPO, RLVR, RLAIF)	references/finetuning-technique/	User has decided to fine-tune and needs to choose a technique, or technique needs validation against the selected model's recipes. Requires a base model to be selected first.
Validate dataset quality and format	references/dataset-evaluation/	User says "is my dataset okay", "check my training data", "I have my own data", or before starting any fine-tuning job.
Transform or convert a dataset between formats	references/dataset-transformation/	User says "transform", "convert", "reformat", or dataset schema needs to change. Always use this rather than writing inline transformation code.
Generate fine-tuning code and start training	references/finetuning/	User says "start training", "fine-tune my model", "I'm ready to train", or plan reaches the finetuning step. Supports SFT, DPO, RLVR, RLAIF trainers.
Evaluate or benchmark a trained model	references/model-evaluation/	User says "evaluate my model", "run a benchmark", "test model performance", "compare models". Supports LLM-as-Judge and Custom Scorer.
Deploy, benchmark, or optimize a model on an endpoint or Bedrock	references/model-deployment/	User says "deploy my model", "create an endpoint", or "make it available" (plain deploy) — or, for the inference-optimization sub-workflows on SageMaker Real-Time Endpoints only, "benchmark my endpoint" / "compare benchmark runs" (benchmarking), or states a performance/cost/latency/throughput goal for a new deployment such as "find the cheapest instance" (recommendations). Handles Nova vs OSS deployment pathways.
Set up IAM roles, S3 buckets, SDK configuration	references/sdk-getting-started/	User says "set up", "getting started", "check my environment", "configure SDK", or as first step in any plan involving SageMaker training/evaluation/deployment.
Manage project directory and artifacts	references/directory-management/	Starting a new project, resuming existing one, or when PLAN.md needs to be associated with a project directory.
Set up, update, or delete a SageMaker Managed MLflow app	references/manage-mlflow/	User says "set up MLflow", "create MLflow app", "update my MLflow app", "delete my MLflow app", "I need an MLflow server", asks "what is SageMaker MLflow", or a workflow needs an MLflow backend and none is connected.
Diagnose a failing or unhealthy SageMaker endpoint	references/endpoint-diagnostics/	User reports endpoint errors, latency, inference failures, or a deployment that failed. "What's the status of my endpoint?", "Is my endpoint erroring?", "My endpoint failed — why?", "How many instances are running behind my endpoint?", "Is the latency my model or SageMaker?", "Show me the container logs for my endpoint." NOT for training-job issues, endpoint deletion, scaling changes, or new deployments.

Rules

• Progressive disclosure. Load only the reference folder relevant to the current user intent. Do not load all references at once.
• Best-effort help. If the user's request falls outside this skill's references, do not dead-end the conversation. Help them using general AWS knowledge and documentation, and inform the user that the guidance is not covered by this skill's validated workflows.
• Usage attribution. Before running any AWS CLI command or packaged script, set export AWS_SDK_UA_APP_ID=AWSSkill-SageMaker.