Adding data to array from an empty query

Question

I am trying to add data to an array from a database query, however some queries will return no data (empty set). In that case I would like to add fake data so that the index size matches my other array (assetsid).
Thank you for your time.
     int f2a=0;
     String[] exportedtime;
     String[] exportedtime_formated;
     ArrayList exportedtime_ar = new ArrayList(f2a);
     ArrayList exportedtime_formated_ar = new ArrayList(f2a);
     for (int jj=0; jj<assetsid_ar.size(); jj++)
          String eng_id_out = (String) eng_id_h2a_ar.get(jj);
          String fuel2a = "select engineserialnumber, TO_CHAR(exportedtime, 'MM/DD/YYYY HH24:MI:SS') exportedtime, TO_CHAR(exportedtime, 'DD/MON/YY') as exportedtime_formated from tblexportedjobs where exportid = (select max(exportid) from tblexportedjobs where engineserialnumber = "+eng_id_out+") and engineserialnumber = "+eng_id_out+"";
          ResultSet fuel2a_myResultSet = stmt.executeQuery(fuel2a);
              while (fuel2a_myResultSet.next()) {
               f2a=f2a+1;
               exportedtime = new String[f2a+1];
               exportedtime_formated = new String[f2a+1];
               exportedtime[f2a]=fuel2a_myResultSet.getString("exportedtime");
               exportedtime_formated[f2a]=fuel2a_myResultSet.getString("exportedtime_formated");
     if (exportedtime[f2a].equals("")) {
    exportedtime[f2a] = "01/01/2004 00:01:01";
     } else {
     exportedtime[f2a] = exportedtime[f2a];
               exportedtime_ar.add(exportedtime[f2a]);
     if (exportedtime_formated[f2a].equals("")) {
    exportedtime_formated[f2a] = "01/JAN/04";
     } else {
     exportedtime_formated[f2a] = exportedtime_formated[f2a];
               exportedtime_formated_ar.add(exportedtime_formated[f2a]);
     }

Answer 1

I'd be curious to know if it would be possible to rewrite your query using a JOIN so you could get all the data in one query. The way you've written it will require N network round trips, where N is the number of engine serial numbers. I wonder if clever application of a JOIN with a GROUP BY would do the trick in one?
I don't care for the formatting stuff you're doing, either. There's no need to ask the database for that. Bring the dates over and handle the formatting in Java using java.text.SimpleDateFormat. Less work for the database AND it won't be so tied to Oracle, since you won't need that TO_CHAR function anymore.
I'd give clients the raw java.sql.Date and let them worry about formatting it the way they wish. That's not a persistence concern.
I always prefer data structures like List and Map when I'm working with database result sets. They grow to fit the # of records that I get back. If I want arrays, I can always use the toArray() method to generate them.