The idea is that a virtual table may reference Arrow data that is not yet available in memory. The implementation will define the semantics of how columns are loaded into memory.

A virtual column interface will need to accompany this. For example:

std::shared_ptr<VirtualTable> vtable = ...;
std::shared_ptr<VirtualColumn> vcolumn = vtable->column(i);
std::shared_ptr<Column> = vcolumn->Materialize();
std::shared_ptr<Table> = vtable->Materialize();

Reporter: Wes McKinney / @wesm
Assignee: Wes McKinney / @wesm

Related issues:

• [C++] Arrow-native C++ Data Frame-style programming interface for analytics (umbrella issue) (is related to)

_{Note: This issue was originally created as ARROW-1329. Please see the migration documentation for further details.}