Support nested list casting
- Dominant language
- Rust
- Stars
- 3.6k
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- Avg merge
- 2d 18h
- Merged PRs (30d)
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Description
**Is your feature request related to a problem or challenge? Please describe what you are trying to do.**
Currently, the implementation of typecasting in the ListArray assumes that the inner elements have the same dimension as the targeted ListArray. However, there is a need to support nested list casting, where the internal elements can have a different dimension than the targeted ListArray.
For example,
Array: ListArray[PrimitiveArray[1,2,3]]
Targeted Type: List(List(Int32))
Current result: ListArray[ListArray[PrimitiveArray[1], PrimitiveArray[2], PrimitiveArray[3]]]
Expected result: ListArray[ListArray[PrimitiveArray[1,2,3]]
**Describe the solution you'd like**
Casting List to the same dimensions first, then cast the inner primitive type. *Only casting from lower dimension to high dimension is allowed*.
Additional: Adding `fn get_list_dimension` for DataType::List is also helpful.
**Describe alternatives you've considered**
**Additional context**
This feature is helpful for https://github.com/apache/arrow-datafusion/issues/6849
Self-assigned
Contributor guide
Research direction
Start by locating the ListArray typecasting implementation and the DataType::List definition mentioned in the issue; inspect how dimensions are currently handled. Add support for casting lower-dimensional lists to higher-dimensional lists before casting the inner primitive type, and consider the requested get_list_dimension helper. Done means the provided ListArray example produces the expected nested result and higher-dimensional casting is covered.
Written by the indexing model from the issue text.
Assessment
- Tech stack
- rust
- Domain
- data-engineering
- Issue type
- Feature
- Difficulty
- 4/5
- Estimated time
- 3-5 days
- Activity status
- Stale
- Clarity
- Mostly clear
- Newbie friendliness
- 40/100