RubyConf 2012 just started, and I’m happy to be back here. It’s at the convention center in Denver, as opposed to just being at the Embassy Suites. It’s a bigger, nicer venue, with the main benefit being that it’s downtown and there’s lots of stuff in walking distance. The downside of the location is that there’s no LTE here. The wifi is passable, though.

Matz, the creator of Ruby officially announced that Ruby 2.0 will be released on its 20th birthday, next February. Preview 1 is out today, and he said that Rails 3.2.x should run on it now.

There are a lot of people here, for a RubyConf—I believe I heard 700. When Matz asked for a show of hands of new people, there were a ton. I’d say the majority of the area I was in raised their hands, although I couldn’t really survey the room from my seat.

Photo note: I only brought my Nikon V1 kit and plan to process photos on my iPad 3 with its camera connection kit. I have a few options for processing to try; the photo above was processed with Nik Software’s SnapSeed, which is pretty impressive. Sadly, it appears that I managed to leave my 10mm f/2.8 at home, but do have my 50mm f/1.4 F-mount Nikkor attached to the FT-1 a adapter, so that will have to be my only low-light option. Luckily the kit lenses have VR.

Ainsley was getting ready to go out, and she just looked so—old isn’t quite the right word, perhaps sophisticated is. She loves her backpack and at the tender age of 4, looks like she’s ready to take on the world when she slings it over her shoulder.

Back in the day, when digital cameras were still relatively new, we all used a new acronym to distinguish a digitalSLR camera from a traditional, film-based SLR. These days, digital is the norm, and there are relatively few companies even producing film cameras. Isn’t it time that we drop the “D” and just refer to the “DSLR” as the “SLR”? Perhaps it makes more sense to refer to the filmSLRs as “FSLRs”.

Furthermore, and I feel less invested in this idea, but several of the new cameras on the market have the shape and generally fit the expectation of an SLR camera (size, performance, interchangable lenses), but don’t actually have a reflex mirror. Perhaps we need an all-new way to describe this class of cameras. More likely, we’d end up with ten ways, none of which anyone used with any consistency, confusing the issue even more. Maybe we should just decide that “SLR” no longer is a real acronym for “single-lens reflex” and just use it to generically refer to the class of cameras which traditionally had that reflex mirror. At least people are generally used to that already, and probably wouldn’t know to not refer to, say, a Sony A99 as anything but an SLR.

When I was pontificating on what I’d like to see in the Nikon 1 V2 the other day, I left one out: The ability to use continuous autofocus (AF-C mode, to Nikon nerds) with the FT-1 adapter and F-mount lenses.

Thinking more on the new lens rumors, I’m bolstered by a new fast prime, and I realize why they did this with a “portrait”-length lens, but why not a really fast “normal” focal length? The 18.5 f/1.8 is inexpensive, but I’d rather it be more expensive and a stop faster. Ditto the 10mm. f/1.2 should be the new mark for these lenses, IMO.

And they can keep all the f/3.5+ lenses.

Now that’s more like it. More fast glass, please!

Also tucked in there is further rumor of the V2. Here’s a short list of what I’m hoping to see:

1. Setting for minimum shutter speed in non-S modes.
2. Histogram while shooting.
3. Get rid of the program modes dial on the back. At the very least, provide a lock for it. Best case: provide a lock and make it control PASM.
4. Built-in GPS and WiFi.

And a real pipe dream I know has no chance of happening:

1. VR built in to the body.

Of course, I’d love to see it get at least on-par with the Sony RX100 in terms of image quality and low-light capability.