digitrance

Come on! You and digitrance know he's not talking about point updates.

Obviously.

While you make the statement that Microsoft’s versioning system is inconsistent, you immediately forget that observation and demand that Microsoft follow your preferred version in scheme. If it doesn’t increment the numbers you expect, you refuse to see it as a major version upgrade. 

The fact is, the software developer gets to decide what constitutes a major version and a minor version, and they decide their own versioning conventions. 

I’ll be the first to admit that Microsoft’s new versioning scheme is non-standard, and probably worse than had they stuck with normal conventions, but they’re happy with it and show no signs of changing for the foreseeable future.

The fact is, Microsoft made a conscious decision that Windows 10 would be the “last version of Windows”, all future versions being a sub-version of 10. It doesn’t make sense to anyone unless maybe you’re in marketing, but there you have it. 

https://www.theverge.com/2015/5/7/8568473/windows-10-last-version-of-windows

With this in mind, it’s fairly obvious (and well-documented, as per the Wikipedia links I shared previously) that Windows 10 has received several major upgrades since its initial release. The updates come through Windows Update classified as Upgrades, not just regular maintenance or security updates. 

But you don’t have to take Microsoft’s word for it. Even by conventional standards (version numbers nonwithstanding), these are major version upgrades, comparable to macOS point versions, because they check all the boxes that separate major upgrades from run-of-the-mill maintenance updates. 

1) They are much larger than regular maintenance updates. 
2) They take much longer to install than regular updates. 
3) They include several new features not present before the upgrade. 
4) Software compatibility can be compromised upon updating.
5) If you don’t upgrade, you will eventually find your OS unsupported. 

As to the last point, Microsoft no longer supports Windows 10 versions 1507, 1511, or 1607. This is because they are major version upgrades, and older versions are being EOL’d.

 I have to correct myself, I think Multiple Desktops shipped with the original Windows 10, but it was functionally unusable to me because you could not have a single window show up on multiple virtual desktops. That feature was added in a later release. 

Additional addendum:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Features_new_to_Windows_10

Don’t get me wrong, I prefer a Mac, but I do work in a Windows world, and to say that Windows 10 has received no updates since 2015 is factually inaccurate. 

corrections said:

digitrance said:

“Windows hasn't even been updated since version 10 appeared in 2015“

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_10_version_history

There are builds and patches, most of which added minor tweaks or changed the UI in ways users weren't happy about. But Windows hasn't been "updated" since the release of Windows 10 in any way comparable to Apple's annual releases. I'm sure you knew that tho.

Multiple Desktops and Windows Subsystem for Linux are two features that immediately come to mind, neither of which shipped with the original Windows 10. I would dare to compare these to the level of features released between versions of macOS.