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This article reexamines Sylvester 'Pat' Weaver's plans for cultural uplift via NBC television in the 1950s. His ambitions have been the subject of much scholarly research, which often notes his 'Operation Frontal Lobes' as influential, citing academic articles published in the 1990s as authoritative. However, contemporary documents show that the 'Frontal Lobes' project never succeeded and the effort became an embarrassment to the network. Taking advantage of searchable, digitized newspapers, magazines, and trade publications and reviewing materials in the NBC archives in Wisconsin, this article attempts a more nuanced understanding of Weaver's influence on NBC programming. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The existing testing theories for CSP cater for verification of interaction patterns (traces) and deadlocks, but not time.We address here refinement and testing based on a dialect of CSP, called tock-CSP,which can capture discrete time properties. This version of CSP has been of widespread interest for decades; recently, it has been given a denotational semantics, and model checking has become possible using a well established tool. Here, we first equip tock-CSP with a novel semantics for testing, which distinguishes input and output events: the standard models of (tock-)CSP do not differentiate them, but for testing this is essential. We then present a new testing theory for timewise refinement, based on novel definitions of test and test execution. Finally, we reconcile refinement and testing by relating timed ioco testing and refinement in tock-CSP with inputs and outputs. With these results, this paper provides, for the first time, a systematic theory that allows both timed testing and timed refinement to be expressed. An important practical consequence is that this ensures that the notion of correctness used by developers guarantees that tests pass when applied to a correct system and, in addition, faults identified during testing correspond to development mistakes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following the end of universal testing in the UK, hospital admissions are a key measure of COVID-19 pandemic pressure. Understanding leading indicators of admissions at the National Health Service (NHS) Trust, regional and national geographies help health services plan for ongoing pressures. We explored the spatio-temporal relationships of leading indicators of hospitalisations across SARS-CoV-2 waves in England. This analysis includes an evaluation of internet search volumes from Google Trends, NHS triage calls and online queries, the NHS COVID-19 app, lateral flow devices (LFDs), and the ZOE app. Data sources were analysed for their feasibility as leading indicators using Granger causality, cross-correlation, and dynamic time warping at fine spatial scales. Google Trends and NHS triages consistently temporally led admissions in most locations, with lead times ranging from 5 to 20 days, whereas an inconsistent relationship was found for the ZOE app, NHS COVID-19 app, and LFD testing, which diminished with spatial resolution, showing cross-correlation of leads between –7 and 7 days. The results indicate that novel surveillance sources can be used effectively to understand the expected healthcare burden within hospital administrative areas though the temporal and spatial heterogeneity of these relationships is a key determinant of their operational public health utility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the curious interface between Beckett's writing and the male-orientated magazine culture of the United States. Throughout the 1960s, Beckett would be solicited for articles by Esquire (advertised as 'The Magazine for Men') including an unlikely invitation to cover the 1968 Democratic Convention. By 1969, a write-up of Kenneth Tynan's Oh! Calcutta! (for which Beckett would contribute the opening skit) would feature prominently in the October issue of Playboy magazine. Despite his often-perplexed reactions, this article suggests that the appeal of Beckett to commercial men's magazines may help to situate the author within mid-century discourses around sexual freedom and 'hip' masculinity. Résumé: Cet article explore la curieuse rencontre entre l' écriture de Beckett et la culture des magazines destinés à un public masculin états-unien. Tout au long des années 1960, Beckett fut sollicité pour écrire des articles dans Esquire (présenté comme "Un magazine pour les hommes") ; de façon improbable, il fut notamment invité à couvrir la Convention démocratique de 1968. En 1969, un article sur Oh ! Calcutta ! de Kenneth Tynan (pour lequel Beckett fournira la saynète d' ouverture) figurera en bonne place dans le numéro d' octobre du magazine Playboy. L' auteur montre que malgré les réactions souvent perplexes de Beckett, son attrait pour les magazines masculins commerciaux peut aider à le situer dans les discours du milieu du siècle sur la liberté sexuelle et une masculinité dite 'branchée'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]