Improving the Windows Console

Although over the years I've run a number of Linux distributions on my main development laptop, for some time now I've been running Windows XP. Of course, anybody who is even vaguely familiar with Linux' powerful command-line interface shudders at the notion of using Windows pathetic console, and accordingly I regularly gnash my teeth over dealing with even rudimentary administration issues. Personally I've never been a fan of Cygwin, and so have sought out other alternatives to the console.

As an alternative to Windows' terminal window, I've long used Console, an open source terminal window replacement which among other things allows the window to be resized. It also supports tabbed windows, meaning you can easily navigate between your MySQL client, Rails console, and Rails log windows for instance.

But even a vastly improved terminal window doesn't resolve one of Windows' other wildly annoying features, or rather lack thereof: crucial commands such as "tail". DOS' built-in “more” command doesn't allow you to view the last X lines of a file, and for crying out loud you'd think they'd have thought to add the tail command to Powershell (such a command exists, but they've mysteriously decided to call it "get-content". "tail" must have been too obvious a choice). Seriously, admitting Unix got something right must be akin to devil worship in Redmond. At any rate, you can add “tail” to your system by installing the Windows Server 2003 Resource Kit Tools package, which is freely available from the Microsoft site. Once installed, you'll have a very Unix-like tail command at your disposal.