Normally I never promote commercial ventures on NorthstarNerd.Org, but how can I resist the personal request recently emailed to me from the Discovery Channel. They are working upon a new program named "Top Engineer", and they want you! The creation of television programming which does not assume we are all brain dead needs to be encouraged (yes, I like the Discovery Channel).

Quoting from their "casting" web site: (application deadline is March 7, 2012)

The Discovery Channel is looking for America’s most creative and daring techies, machinists, inventors and engineers to design, build, and BLAST their way to a Grand Prize on their new competition TV show TOP ENGINEER.

A handful of lucky men and women will be chosen to take on exciting challenges from various engineering fields at the state-of-the-art WET design facilities (www.wetdesign.com) in California.

No, you don’t need to have an engineering degree to compete on this show, but you MUST be able to design, build, test and integrate an idea into a final product that WORKS.

Do you think you are creative when it comes to inventing? Why not apply! Perhaps you could become famous like the stars of American Choppers or Deadliest Catch.

I have attached their pdf file to this post if you want more information. As a fyi, I did not receive any pay, or gifts in kind to promote Top Engineer. NorthstarNerd.Org never takes any pay from vendors, or accepts advertisements. 

Videos have header files associated with your movie which serve like a road map in terms of giving instructions to your computer. This header file has all kinds of technical information which not being present, will prevent your computer from even opening the file (let alone playing it).

Recently I had a problem when one of my video header files became corrupt due to a power failure during filming. Given the header file is the last item written to a video file, if power is ever interrupted to your camera, you will have a major wasted effort. Editing a header file is not for the weak of heart, and even this "nerd" did not want to make the attempt. 

After hours of scouring the web for some means of rescuing my video, I found a great (and free) utility named Fix Player (review and download options via Softperdia). This software package saved me from disaster. I was able to open my corrupt file, view it, and most importantly … save it successfully with a new header file (use a new file name).

New dictionary term this Winter: Nordic Nomad.

Definition: Northern tribe of humans often found travelling great distances in search of white stuff. Distinguishing features: Wears bright clothing and moves on long skinny sticks. Conversations are most often centered around a "class of chemical compounds that are plastic (malleable) near ambient temperatures. Characteristically, they melt above 45 °C (113 °F) to give a low viscosity liquid, but soluble in organic, nonpolar solvents" (quoted text from Wikipedia)

Are you a Nordic Nomad?

Just in case you've been asleep for the past two years, orchestrated flash mobs have been sweeping the globe. One of the best takes place in the Copenhagen train station involving the local symphony. However, as much as I like the effort from my Danish cousins, this blog focuses upon technical content, quite often engineering material.

Thus, can you imagine what it might have felt like as a first year engineering student at the University of Toronto … taking an exam (sounds like it was a sample exam during freshman week). Still cool! The new students don't know how to respond!