I agree with you - and I did not mean 'arcane' to be derogatory. I only meant to draw attention to the difference in economy - nix operators expect robust tools, capable of *every* nuance and function, where win operators rely more upon simpler tools, more purpose built... It is natural in the nix world to remain within the on-board tools (because the tools are robust), whereas it is natural in win to lug around a toy box full of tools that have been specifically sought out for a purpose (because the on-board tools could not do what was necessary).
No doubt the final advantage goes to you, once you've mastered the use of the provided tools (no small thing), and especially so, because all you need is already on-board. There is very little need for purpose-built external applications in nix.
But I have an advantage or two also - I only need to learn what I need - simple tools, and simple syntax, bent toward specific purposes... I carried a tool called 'Swiss Army Knife' for a while - The thing could do dang near anything. but it's syntax was so elaborate and unintuitive that I finally discarded it and wrote simple tools to replace it with.
It is that mind-set difference that I am pointing out. It isn't whether one is preferred to the other - just different. It isn't like I am prevented from doing anything I need to do. And while I can get pretty grumpy about adding yet another external console app to my toolbox, there really isn't anything I have endeavored to do on a win box that I have failed to accomplish.
The fact that you can use nothing but standard command line tools without even making use of any of the more esoteric functions and use them to manipulate data points up the inherent power 30+ years of development by people who want the power have given us un unix systems.
First off, I don't know anyone who wants less power in this game, no matter which field of computing they are in - It is just a matter of course, being a win guy, that long ago I was driven away from any expectation of the cmd box having what I need - But what I need is readily available (or easily written), and all I need to do is carry a thumb with me - simply firing a specialized cmd stub on that thumb hauls me up a cmd box with all my toys pathed and with (super) elevated privileges. Get my hands on a box and I can hack it any way you like.
It is a bit more of a kludge if I have to go remote, or have a client operate a process in the field - I have portable packages for doing that, but I always have to be sure that it's dependencies are available, and one must routinely be aware to write scripts fault-protected against their absence... but somehow, I get along just fine.
I don't begrudge the power of unix - hell, I have most of the ported unix tools as part of my tools - Nor do I begrudge that Windows has a comparatively weak console. It really doesn't matter once one figures out how to work with external apps and make them portable... with that addition, the Windows console can be anything you want it to be.
Windows and Unix mentalities are definitely different, and you actually have to have a much different way of looking at them to make the computers work for you. Linux fits the way I work, and that's cool. If Windows fits the way you work, that's cool too.
My biggest problem with windows, is the fact that even those of us hard-core unix geeks have to be familiar with windows, which generally gives us a broader breadth of experience, while the same is not true for windows users.