Windows has C-style, shared libraries just like Linux - DLLs. The entire Win32 API that is the backbone of Windows is implemented in system DLLs. Every compil

Windows has C-style, shared libraries just like Linux - DLLs. The entire Win32 API that is the backbone of Windows is implemented in system DLLs. Every compiler that produces native binaries for Windows links with these DLLs (C, C++, Go, FreePascal/Delphi, etc.), either statically or dynamically, using C calling conventions. COM is the Component Object Model, which is implemented in DLLs, but is something different: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Component_Object_Model https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Component_Object_Model COM, or some form of it, is used heavily with .NET and the new UWP runtime, but those are newer runtimes that sort of sit on top of the Win32 API (to some extent, UWP is actually integrated into the OS itself, but, AFAIK, still uses the underlying Win32 APIs).