[Design] [Form Recognizer | Table Indexer] Implement indexer on ExtractedTable to index into Cells array

[annelo-msft]

Summary

Tables cells are available in Form Recognizer output in order to use them in application UI, rather than for data analysis. Given this, providing a table indexer that allows callers to index into a given cell in the table by row, col, is a more idiomatic approach than having an array of cells users must iterate through to find a given cell.

One question that arises is how to handle column span and row span.

We should understand prior approaches in BCL/.NET and design an approach for indexing into table cells consistent with these.

The resulting API will likely look like:

public class ExtractedTable {
    public ExtractedTableCell[] Cells { get; }
    ...

See:

azure-sdk-for-net/sdk/formrecognizer/Azure.AI.FormRecognizer/src/ExtractedTable.cs

Line 24 in ce04694

// TODO: implement table indexer

Goals

• Identify examples of table indexers elsewhere in BCL/.NET to understand precedents
• Design an API for indexing into table cells consistent with other BCL/.NET types
• Review design with feature crew and architects
• Implement design

[annelo-msft]

@ctstone @mayurid

[AlexGhiondea]

@annelo-msft could you please update the title?

[annelo-msft]

#10537 to be done as part of this work.

[maririos]

We will like to get more information about the usage of this feature to help shape the design.
Moving to backlog

[pallavit]

Closing this, and will reopen if there is a customer need for this feature.