Re: [Emacs-diffs] master 4d3a595: `load-path' should contain only directory names

[Wolfgang Jenkner]

On Wed, Oct 28 2015, Richard Stallman wrote:

> In GNU, we reserve the term "path" for a list of directories to
> search.  We use the term "file name" to refer to a name that can be
> used to open a file.  This eliminates an illogical ambiguity in Unix
> terminology.

IIUC, this ambiguity doesn't exists in POSIX terminology, though, as
they seem to use the term "pathname".

By definition, a "pathname" can have trailing slashes, a "filename" can't.

Relevant to the present discussion, there also exists a "path prefix",
which is

    The part of a pathname up to, but not including, the last component
    and any trailing <slash> characters, unless the pathname consists
    entirely of <slash> characters, [...]
    

Those definitions can be found in [1].

Accordingly, [2] explains that

PATH

    shall represent the sequence of path prefixes [...]

[1] http://pubs.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/9699919799/basedefs/V1_chap03.html

[2] http://pubs.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/9699919799/basedefs/V1_chap08.html