Distil-Localdoc-Qwen3-0.6B

A small language model (SLM) fine-tuned by Distil Labs for generating high-quality Python docstrings in Google style. Optimized to run locally via Ollama, ensuring your proprietary code never leaves your infrastructure.

*********** GITHUB DEMO AND CODE ***********

Model Details

Developed by: Distil Labs GmbH
License: Apache 2.0
Finetuned from: Qwen/Qwen3-0.6B
Model Size: 0.6B parameters
Deployment: Local inference via Ollama

Use-case

Given Python functions or methods without docstrings, the model generates complete, properly formatted documentation following Google style guide.

Before:

def calculate_total(items, tax_rate=0.08, discount=None):
    subtotal = sum(item['price'] * item['quantity'] for item in items)
    if discount:
        subtotal *= (1 - discount)
    return subtotal * (1 + tax_rate)

After:

def calculate_total(items, tax_rate=0.08, discount=None):
    """
    Calculate the total cost of items, applying a tax rate and optionally a discount.
    
    Args:
        items: List of item objects with price and quantity
        tax_rate: Tax rate expressed as a decimal (default 0.08)
        discount: Discount rate expressed as a decimal; if provided, the subtotal is multiplied by (1 - discount)
    
    Returns:
        Total amount after applying the tax
    
    Example:
        >>> items = [{'price': 10, 'quantity': 2}, {'price': 5, 'quantity': 1}]
        >>> calculate_total(items, tax_rate=0.1, discount=0.05)
        22.5
    """
    subtotal = sum(item['price'] * item['quantity'] for item in items)
    if discount:
        subtotal *= (1 - discount)
    return subtotal * (1 + tax_rate)

The model handles:

Functions: Parameter descriptions, return values, exceptions, and usage examples
Methods: Instance and class method documentation with proper formatting
Note: The tool skips double underscore (dunder: xxx) methods

Why Local?

Privacy & Security: Proprietary codebases contain intellectual property and trade secrets. Cloud APIs create:

IP exposure risks
Compliance violations (GDPR, SOC 2, HIPAA)
Security audit failures
Dependency on external services

Speed & Cost: Document entire codebases in minutes without API rate limits or per-token charges.

Training

The tuned model was trained using knowledge distillation, leveraging the teacher model GPT-OSS-120B. We used 28 diverse Python functions and classes as seed data and supplemented them with 10,000 synthetic examples covering various domains:

Data science and machine learning
Web development (Flask, FastAPI, Django)
DevOps and system utilities
Algorithm implementations
API clients and wrappers

Training data includes examples with:

Various function complexities (simple to async patterns)
Error handling patterns
Async/await patterns
Different parameter types and return values

Evaluation

We evaluated the model on 250 held-out test examples using LLM-as-a-judge methodology to assess the overall quality of generated docstrings.

Model	Size	Accuracy
GPT-OSS (thinking)	120B	0.81 ± 0.02
Qwen3 0.6B (tuned)	0.6B	0.76 ± 0.01
Qwen3 0.6B (base)	0.6B	0.55 ± 0.04

The fine-tuned model achieves 94% of the teacher model's performance while running entirely on local hardware with zero API costs and complete privacy.

How to Use

Installation

Follow the instructions in the Github repository

Quick start:

# Install Ollama
curl -fsSL https://ollama.com/install.sh | sh

# Download and build the model
pip install huggingface_hub
hf download distil-labs/Distil-Localdoc-Qwen3-0.6B --local-dir distil-model
cd distil-model
ollama create localdoc_qwen3 -f Modelfile

# Run on your code
python localdoc_cli.py --file your_script.py

CLI Usage

# Basic usage (generates Google-style docstrings)
python localdoc_cli.py --file my_module.py

# Use specific model
python localdoc_cli.py --file my_module.py --model localdoc_qwen3

The tool will:

Parse your Python file using AST
Identify all functions and methods without docstrings (skips dunder methods)
Generate appropriate docstrings based on code structure
Preserve all original code and existing docstrings
Output a new file with _documented suffix

Model Sources

Homepage: https://distillabs.ai
Repository: https://github.com/distil-labs/Distil-localdoc
Contact: [email protected]

Citation

@software{distil_localdoc_2024,
  title = {Distil-Localdoc: Local Python Documentation Generation with SLMs},
  author = {Distil Labs},
  year = {2024},
  url = {https://huggingface.co/distil-labs/Distil-Localdoc-Qwen3-0.6B}
}