Terraform

Terraforming is a highly useful yet difficult method of making dead planets habitable.

Inventor
Nobody has been able to successfully track down the person who initially invented terraforming. Many people, however, consider it to be a recent discovery.

Variations
Terraforming can apply to two things - changing the shape of the planet and changing the planet's properties. Terraforming that changes the shape of the planet occur instintaneously and include (but not limited to) rising ground level, lowering ground level, making oceans, leveling ground level, and such.

Terraforming that changes the planet's properties are those that affect the temperature, those that affect the atmosphere, those that affect the planet's position, and those that affect the water levels. If any one of these is taken out of the equation of a dead planet, it most likely will not be able to support life. This kind of terraforming is very expensive and hard to replace, and if a planet collides with another planet or moon in the process of changing its position, it is possible to get charged a fine for misuse.

Age
There is no definite record of how long terraforming has been around, but some say for at least 5,000 years.