Wire up temperature-based sampling for poet text generation
Greedy argmax decoding in RbmListener::forward always produces the exact same character sequence and quickly falls into short repeating loops once the 5-character lookback state revisits a prior cycle. Add an optional temperature argument (poet f <seed> [temperature]) that switches decoding to RnnStack::sample_one_hot, which now does proper categorical sampling (temperature-scaled, renormalized draw) instead of the old per-code Bernoulli approach that could leave the result as a non-one-hot probability vector. Also seed Armadillo's RNG in main(), since it otherwise defaults to a fixed seed and every run would sample identically. Add docs/RNN_ARCHITECTURE.md documenting how the RnnStack/Layer stack implements the RNN (context chaining across layers, training/generation data flow, and the decoding behavior above). Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 5 <noreply@anthropic.com> Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_016K8Gu7Qejd11JbdiHZqYAs
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Claude Sonnet 5
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# The RNN used by `poet` (`RnnStack`)
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This document explains how `RnnStack` — the model driving the `poet` character-generation
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CLI — actually works. It is not an RNN in the LSTM/GRU sense: there is no shared weight matrix
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applied repeatedly across time. Instead it's a **stack of independently-weighted RBMs, one per
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"tap" in a fixed-size lookback window, chained together by feeding each layer's hidden
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activations forward as extra "context" input to the next layer**. The recurrence is emulated by
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re-running this same chain one step at a time during generation, sliding a window of the last N
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characters through it.
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Relevant sources: `source/RnnStack.{hpp,cpp}`, `source/Layer.{hpp,cpp}`, `source/AStack.cpp`,
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`source/RnnTextHelper.{hpp,cpp}`, `source/matutils.hpp`, `source/poet.cpp`.
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## The alphabet
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`RnnTextHelper` encodes characters as one-hot vectors over `NUM_CODES = 37` symbols:
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- index `0` = space (also the fallback for anything that isn't a letter or digit)
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- indices `1..26` = `A`..`Z` (case is folded via `toupper` — **lowercase is not represented**)
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- indices `27..36` = `0`..`9`
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`ch2idx`/`idx2ch` do the conversion; `Matutils::char2vec`/`vec2char` wrap them as one-hot
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`arma::mat` rows. Because case is discarded at encoding time, everything `poet` generates comes
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out upper-case, regardless of the casing in the source text or seed string.
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## Project geometry: `poet_2v_5s`
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`poet.cpp` hardcodes the project name `poet_2v_5s`, loaded via `StackCreator::fromFile`. The name
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encodes its shape: **2v** = 2 stacked visible character-frames per layer, **5s** = 5 layers deep
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(the RBM "stack"). Concretely (`poet_2v_5s.prj`):
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| layer id | visible (X×Y) | hidden | context |
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|---|---|---|---|
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| 0 | 37×2 = 74 | 128 | 0 |
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| 1 | 37×2 = 74 | 128 | 128 |
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| 2 | 37×2 = 74 | 128 | 128 |
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| 3 | 37×2 = 74 | 128 | 128 |
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| 4 | 37×2 = 74 | 128 | 128 |
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Each `Layer` is a plain `Rbm` (`Layer.hpp:29` → `Rbm(numVisibleX*numVisibleY + numContext,
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numHidden)`), so layers 1–4 are actually 202-visible-unit RBMs (74 character bits + 128 context
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bits inherited from the previous layer); layer 0 has no context and is a plain 74-unit RBM.
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`RnnStack::getSeqLen()` returns `numLayers()` (5) — the "depth" of the stack doubles as the length
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of the character lookback window used during generation.
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## Training data: character bigrams
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`RnnTextHelper::createTraining(file, seq_len=2)` turns a text file into a training batch:
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- keeps a rolling 2-row window (`pattern`) of one-hot vectors: `row0` = current character,
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`row1` = previous character (each new character shifts the window and overwrites row 0).
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- collapses runs of whitespace/unknown characters down to a single space (skips a char if both it
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and the previous character map to index 0).
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- for every accepted character, flattens `pattern` row-major (`as_row()`, confirmed block order:
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`[current(37) | previous(37)]`) and appends it as one training row.
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So the batch has one 74-wide row per character in the source text: `[char_t | char_t-1]`. This
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matches every layer's 74-wide visible geometry — every layer is trained on the *same* stream of
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character bigrams, just offset in time from each other (next section).
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## Training: `RnnStack::train`
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```cpp
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padding = zeros(numLayers - 1, batch.n_cols) // 4 zero rows
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batch_padded = [batch ; padding] // append padding at the end
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c = zeros(N, layer[0].numContext()) // starts as an N×0 matrix (no columns)
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for i in 0..numLayers-1:
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layer = getLayer(i)
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batch_shifted = batch_padded.rows(i, N+i-1) // batch, shifted forward by i rows
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vc = join_rows(batch_shifted, c) // attach inherited context
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layer.train(vc, listener) // contrastive divergence on this layer
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layer.gibbs_vh(vc, c) // c ← toHiddenProbs(vc); vc ← reconstruction (vc discarded)
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```
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The subtlety is `c`: it starts as a zero-column matrix (matching layer 0, which has no context),
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and is **mutated in place** by `gibbs_vh` on every iteration — `gibbs_vh(v_probs, h_probs)` sets
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`h_probs = toHiddenProbs(v_probs)`, so after layer *i* trains, `c` becomes layer *i*'s hidden-unit
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probabilities, which is exactly what layer *i+1* expects as its context input. This is the whole
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recurrence mechanism: **each layer's hidden activations become the next layer's extra visible
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input**, propagated forward once per training step.
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`batch_shifted` is `batch_padded` windowed with an offset of `i` rows, i.e. layer `i` is trained on
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training-row `j+i` while the loop index is conceptually `j`. So for a given alignment index `j`,
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layer 0 sees the bigram at `j`, layer 1 sees the bigram at `j+1`, ..., layer 4 sees the bigram at
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`j+4` (the most recent). In other words: **layer 0 is the "oldest" tap, layer 4 the "newest"**, and
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by the time training reaches layer 4, its context input already encodes information recursively
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folded in from characters `j..j+3`. This is a 5-character lookback window, unrolled across depth
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(distinct weights per tap) rather than across time (shared weights) as a true RNN would.
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## Generation: `RnnStack::step_forward`
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`state` is a rolling `numLayers × NUM_CODES` matrix of single-character one-hot rows: row 0 is the
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newest character, row `numLayers-1` the oldest of the last 5. Each call:
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```cpp
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state = shift(state, 1, 0); // age every row down by one
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state.row(0) = v_curr; // newest known character goes in at row 0
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for j in 0..numLayers-1:
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k = numLayers - j - 1 // j=0 → k=4 (oldest); j=4 → k=0 (newest/current)
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layer = getLayer(j)
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v = [zeros(37) | state.row(k)] // "unknown target" bigram: only the lagged half is known
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vc = join_rows(v, c) // attach context inherited from layer j-1
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layer.gibbs_vh(vc, c) // c ← this layer's hidden probs (context for next layer)
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r = vc_to_v(vc, layer.numContext())// strip context columns back off
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return r // == the last layer's (j=4, k=0) reconstruction
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```
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Each layer is asked "given only the known previous character (`state.row(k)`) plus context
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inherited from older taps, reconstruct the full bigram" — the zeroed first half is what the RBM's
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one round of Gibbs sampling (`toHiddenProbs` then `toVisibleProbs`) has to fill in. Only the
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**last** layer's reconstruction (built from the newest character, `k=0`, with all four older
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layers' context folded in) is returned; `to_next()` (`RnnStack.cpp:121`) takes the first 37 columns
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of that as the network's guess for the *next* character.
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## Decoding: `poet.cpp` / `RbmListener::forward`
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`forward()` takes an optional `temperature` (default `0.0`):
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```cpp
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auto pickNext = [temperature](arma::mat &next) {
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if (temperature > 0.0) stack->sample_one_hot(next, temperature);
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else stack->clamp_one_hot(next);
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};
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// priming: feed the seed string character-by-character to populate `state`
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for each char in seed:
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r = step_forward(state, char2vec(char))
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next = to_next(r); pickNext(next) // result unused except to keep looping
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// generation: feed each predicted character back in as the next input
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for i in seqLen..len:
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curr = next
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r = step_forward(state, curr)
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next = to_next(r); pickNext(next)
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```
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`temperature <= 0` keeps the original behavior: `clamp_one_hot` is a hard argmax (`index_max()` →
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one-hot), fully deterministic given a trained model and a seed. `temperature > 0` instead calls
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`sample_one_hot` (`RnnStack.cpp`), which now does proper categorical sampling: the 37 independent
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sigmoid activations in `next` are raised to `1/temperature` and renormalized into a distribution
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(`temperature < 1` sharpens it towards argmax, `temperature > 1` flattens it towards uniform), then
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one code is drawn from that distribution via a cumulative-sum draw. This replaced an older
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implementation that sampled each code as an independent Bernoulli and only patched the result back
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into a proper one-hot vector when *more than one* bit happened to fire — leaving `srcDst` as a
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non-one-hot probability vector whenever exactly zero or one bits fired.
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`main()` exposes this as a third CLI argument: `poet f <seed> [temperature]`, e.g. `poet f "the "
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0.7`. Sampling only produces different output across process runs because `main()` now seeds
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Armadillo's RNG (`arma::arma_rng::set_seed_random()`) — Armadillo otherwise defaults to a fixed
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seed, which would have made every run's "random" draws identical.
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`RnnStack::to_curr()` is also computed once per generation step but its result is immediately
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discarded (overwritten by `curr = next` at the top of the next iteration) — dead code kept from
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development/debugging.
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Two consequences worth knowing when reading `poet` output:
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- **Greedy argmax decoding (`temperature <= 0`, the default) is why generated text degenerates into
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short repeating loops** (e.g. `...MURPURSE AN MURPURSE AN...`) once the rolling 5-character state
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re-enters a cycle it has visited before — there's no randomness to break out. Passing a
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`temperature > 0` avoids this by sampling instead.
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- If the seed string is shorter than `numLayers` (5) characters, the oldest rows of `state` are
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still zero (not a space one-hot) when generation begins — the model briefly sees "blank" rather
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than real history for the first few generated characters.
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## Summary picture
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```
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Text file --collapse whitespace, bigram window--> training batch [char_t | char_t-1] (74-wide rows)
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│
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┌─────────────────────────────────────┴─────────────────────────────────────┐
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│ Layer 0 (oldest tap, no context) │
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│ CD train on batch │
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│ context₀ = hidden_probs(batch) ──► fed into Layer 1 │
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│ Layer 1 (context=128) │
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│ CD train on [batch shifted +1 | context₀] │
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│ context₁ = hidden_probs(...) ──► fed into Layer 2 │
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│ ... │
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│ Layer 4 (newest tap) │
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│ CD train on [batch shifted +4 | context₃] │
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└───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
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Generation: same 5-layer chain, run once per output character, consuming a sliding 5-character
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window of state (oldest → layer 0 ... newest → layer 4), context threaded the same way; only
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layer 4's reconstruction is decoded (argmax) into the next character.
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```
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