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From: Stephane Chazelas <stephane.chazelas@gmail.com>
Newsgroups: gnu.bash.bug
Subject: Re: Pathname expansion vs. filename expansion
Date: Tue, 20 Aug 2019 16:30:21 +0100
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2019-08-20 16:15:42 +0100, Stephane Chazelas:
[...]
> https://www.gnu.org/prep/standards/html_node/GNU-Manuals.html#GNU-Manuals
> 
> GNU> Please do not use the term “pathname” that is used in Unix
> GNU> documentation; use “file name” (two words) instead. We use the
> GNU> term “path” only for search paths, which are lists of directory
> GNU> names. 
> 
> So I guess that should be "file name expansion"
> 
> That's probably not the right place to argue whether that GNU
> recommendations makes sense, but note that the FTP RFC (1985
> https://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc959.txt, so predates POSIX if not
> the GNU project) defines pathname as
[...]

Actually, Unix V1 in 1970 already used "pathname" for that, long
before the concept of the environment (let alone $PATH) was
introduced.

I don't know why rms insists on using "file name" here which at
best is ambiguous.

See
https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-standards/2009-11/msg00003.html
and rms response:
https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-standards/2009-11/msg00005.html

See also "filename generation" or "globbing" which avoid the
potential confusion with ~user and <(...) which also are
"pathname expansion" operators.

-- 
Stephane