Could any one please help me to understand what are the ‘protos’ in TF Object Detection?

Hi there,

I am a beginner and struggling a bit to understand what are the
‘protos’ in TF Object Detection?

Why do we need them here?

Also, while setting up the TF API we need to download and
compile protocol buffers.

There is also a ‘protos’ folder when one downloads the object
detection module – could anyone please explain me what are those
and what is the relationship between them?

This would be of immense help!

Thanks!