Typing rain
The assembled group of SLAC users hushed as Gabriella Sciolla rose to open the SLAC Users Organization annual meeting. And with that quiet came the rain. Not falling-from-the-sky precipitation but the randomly dispersed patter of laptop keyboards, which had started ten minutes earlier but had gone unnoticed in the din of conversation.
Nobody seemed much troubled by the noise as it rose and fell in waves, sheets of noise traveling through the auditorium; Jonathan Dorfan's "State of the Lab" presentation enlivened the drizzle like crackles of thunder.
A quick count revealed about three people for each laptop. Although only one of the former was tapping at each of the latter, others cast surreptitious glances over the flickering screens. Watching the watchers showed what caught the most attention. Least interesting, but most common in the room, seemed to be one or other email client relaying empty banter around the world, or perhaps to the other side of the room. More inviting of glances were the rough drafts of presentations to appear later in the meeting. Figures being shifted, enlarged; captions being adjusted; PowerPoint bullets being filled.
And yet, as one speaker after another talked of the things most critical to the daily working lives of SLAC users, the screens of most interest to the inquisitive revealed news about the world outside this indoor rainstorm.
David Harris
