It's surely saying something that an operating system meant only for testing, that warns you not to install it on "your everyday computer" because it's not yet ready for everyday use, has become the system we have been using all day every day of late.

And it's certainly saying something that, even after that very operating system did what we were warned it might do, freezing up and eating an entire morning's work, we still continue to use it here in the Digital Life Labs and rely on it for most of our work. I'm relying on it now, to write this column, for instance.

Actually, it's saying several things.

One is that the system in question, the soon-to-be-released Microsoft Windows 10, has already become pretty good, even though it's not finished and still has bugs in it that, from time to time, cause it to freeze up. When it's finished in a month or so from now (it's expected to be launched in late July), Windows 10 is almost certainly going to be very good indeed.

Another is that the system Windows 10 is designed to replace, Microsoft Windows 8, hasn't set a very high bar as far as replaceability goes. In fact, it's set a bar so low, even unfinished software that crashes and costs us hours of work is preferable.

And the third thing it says is we're a little reckless and probably should have heeded Microsoft's advice and hung onto Windows 8 for just a bit longer, before we booted it onto the street.

But it's hard to resist the charms of Windows 10, one of which is that it no longer has that Windows 8 charm bar over to the right of the screen, but rather makes use of the charm bar gesture (a right-to-left slide on the edge of the screen, if you have a touch-screen device) for a notifications and settings bar, just like you might find on a mobile phone.

It's probably no coincidence that Windows 10 is starting to share features with mobile phone operating systems, because Microsoft's plan is for it to operate more or less universally, regardless of whether you're using it on a notebook PC, tablet or mobile phone.

Oh bugger! The word processor I am writing this in just crashed. But I didn't lose any work this time. It's a measure of how keen I am to get off Windows 8 that I'm sticking with it.

The last time we reviewed Windows 10, it was an older test "build" of the software, since which there have been three or four major updates.

Our main complaint then was that Windows 10 felt like a quick and dirty overhaul of Windows 8, in which some features had been updated and some not. Using it was like walking through a supposedly renovated house, only to open a door and find an entire wing that still had the old wallpaper.

Well I'm pleased to tell you that, with each new build, the renovation is getting more complete. With this latest version, pretty well all of the the rooms have been done, though you can still find signs of the old wallpaper when you open the cupboards, or peer under the sink.

"Settings" is the most obvious example. In the earlier builds of Windows 10, as with Windows 8, you didn't have to use the new, universal-style settings too long before you wound up back in the old Windows-style of settings.

But with every build, more and more are getting refashioned in the universal style, which is designed to work just as well with your finger touching the screen as with a mouse and keyboard.

The start menus and the task bar, too, are getting better with every build, to the point where many features are starting to work exactly as you hope they might when you click on them.

Click on the date and time on the task bar, for instance, and up pops a big, friendly calendar, which is exactly what I've always wanted that click to do. I realise I've been making that click for years, on both Windows machines and Macs, but never getting the result I wanted until now.

It's as if, with Windows 10, Microsoft has somehow been listening to its customers and letting us decide how things should operate.

Which is precisely what Microsoft has been doing. A large purpose of these Windows 10 builds, flawed as they may be, is to allow Microsoft to watch how people do things and tailor the final product to match.

If nobody clicks on a feature, or if a lot of people click on a feature but then back out of it because it's not what they were hoping for, Microsoft pays attention. With every passing build, it's becoming increasingly evident Windows 10 is going to be an operating system for the people.

So before it's too late, you should install a test build of Windows 10 on your everyday PC and start using it, so Microsoft can gauge how you want your operating system to work You'll be doing all of us a favour.

You just might not be doing yourself any favours, not in the short term, not if you lose work when it freezes up.

http://www.afr.com/technology/unfinished-windows-10-makes-itself-indispensable-20150601-ghac8n