Large language model for table processing: a survey  

作　　者：Weizheng LU Jing ZHANG Ju FAN Zihao FU Yueguo CHEN Xiaoyong DU 

机构地区：[1]School of Information,Renmin University of China,Beijing 100872,China [2]Key Laboratory of Data Engineering and Knowledge Engineering,Beijing 100872,China [3]WPS Office,Kingsoft Co.,Zhuhai 519080,China

出　　处：《Frontiers of Computer Science》2025年第2期71-87,共17页计算机科学前沿(英文版)

基　　金：supported by the National Key R&D Program of China(2023YFF0725100);the National Natural Science Foundation of China(Grant Nos.62322214,62272466);the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities and the Research Funds of Renmin University of China(24XNKJ22)。

摘　　要：Tables,typically two-dimensional and structured to store large amounts of data,are essential in daily activities like database queries,spreadsheet manipulations,Web table question answering,and image table information extraction.Automating these table-centric tasks with Large Language Models(LLMs)or Visual Language Models(VLMs)offers significant public benefits,garnering interest from academia and industry.This survey provides a comprehensive overview of table-related tasks,examining both user scenarios and technical aspects.It covers traditional tasks like table question answering as well as emerging fields such as spreadsheet manipulation and table data analysis.We summarize the training techniques for LLMs and VLMs tailored for table processing.Additionally,we discuss prompt engineering,particularly the use of LLM-powered agents,for various tablerelated tasks.Finally,we highlight several challenges,including diverse user input when serving and slow thinking using chainof-thought.

关 键 词：data mining and knowledge discovery table processing large language model 

分 类 号：TP3[自动化与计算机技术—计算机科学与技术]