For my day job I work on Ubuntu 7.10 on a daily basis. I always keep my app server running while I code, and I watch my logs not from Netbeans but from a shell window:
tail -f log/development.log
If I want to filter that I open another shell and filter as I like:
tail -f log/development.log | grep "Parameters"
However, on a recent consulting gig, I had to work on Windows. I had to train the client’s development team on RoR, and I had to make sure their experience in moving from Java to RoR was as smooth as possible. I still believe a *nix OS is the ideal environment for doing RoR development, but I didn’t want to force them to learn too many things at the same time. And, after all, I’m being paid to teach them RoR, not UNIX.
What to do? Google for Windows ports! Here’s what I recommend for who have to use Windows workstations to develop web services that will be deployed on *NIX: