version number of Linux kernel development

[Yubin Ruan]

Hi, 
I got a question regarding to Linux's version number. According to some talk
from Greg KH, there would be an accompanying stable release along with every
-rc release, that is, something like this:

         4.2.0
          |       \
    4.3.1-rc    4.2.1
          |        |
    4.3.2-rc     4.2.2
          |        |
    4.3.3-rc     4.2.3
          |        |
    4.3.4-rc     4.2.4
          |        |
    4.3.5-rc     4.2.5
          |        |
    4.3.6-rc     4.2.6
          |        |
    4.3.7-rc     4.2.7   <- this branch is thrown away after 4.4.0 is released
          |
    4.4.0

So, in this example, 4.2.7 would be thrown away after 4.4.0 is released. Is
this the same for every major release?

I see a series of 4.4.x release, ranging from 4.4.1 ~ 4.4.49, at 
    http://elixir.free-electrons.com/linux/latest/source
which really confused me. Accoding to the model above, there should be only
4.4.7. After that, it would 4.5.x.

Please correct me if I am wrong.

Thanks,
Yubin