Pre-credits scene is one of the longest in Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987), around seven minutes long.
Script was not originally written for Lt. Barclay. However, the producers were looking for a vehicle to bring back the character from Hollow Pursuits (1990).
Live lasers were used in the scenes where Barclay interfaces with the computer.
The overall plot is similar to the 1968 film Charly (1968) (based on the book "Flowers for Algernon" by Daniel Keyes) about a man who is suddenly given super human intelligence, only to later lose it all and return to the man he once was.