Jörn Horstmann created ARROW-8383:
-------------------------------------

             Summary: [RUST] Easier random access to DictionaryArray keys and 
values
                 Key: ARROW-8383
                 URL: https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/ARROW-8383
             Project: Apache Arrow
          Issue Type: Improvement
          Components: Rust
            Reporter: Jörn Horstmann


Currently it's not that clear how to acces DictionaryArray keys and values 
using random indices.

The `DictionaryArray::keys` method exposes an Iterator with an `nth` method, 
but this requires a mut reference and feels a little bit out of place compared 
to other methods of accessing arrow data.

Another alternative seems to be to use the `From<ArrayDataRef> for 
PrimitiveArray<T>` conversion like so `let keys : Int16Array = 
dictionary_array.data().into()`. This seems to work fine but is not easily 
discoverable and also needs to be done outside of any loops for performance 
reasons.

I'd like methods on `DictionaryArray` to directly get the key at some index

```
 pub fn key(&self, i: usize) -> &K
```

Ideally I'd also like an easier way to directly access values at some index, at 
least when those are primitive or string types.

```
pub fn value(&self, i: usize) -> &T
```

I'm not sure how or if that would be possible to implement with rust generics.

 



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