path: add platform specific path delimiter

Closes #3728
Closes #4071

doc/api/path.markdown

@@ -14,7 +14,7 @@ Normalize a string path, taking care of `'..'` and `'.'` parts.
 
 When multiple slashes are found, they're replaced by a single one;
 when the path contains a trailing slash, it is preserved.
-On windows backslashes are used. 
+On Windows backslashes are used.
 
 Example:
 
@@ -44,7 +44,7 @@ Resolves `to` to an absolute path.
 If `to` isn't already absolute `from` arguments are prepended in right to left
 order, until an absolute path is found. If after using all `from` paths still
 no absolute path is found, the current working directory is used as well. The
-resulting path is normalized, and trailing slashes are removed unless the path 
+resulting path is normalized, and trailing slashes are removed unless the path
 gets resolved to the root directory. Non-string arguments are ignored.
 
 Another way to think of it is as a sequence of `cd` commands in a shell.
@@ -143,14 +143,36 @@ an empty string.  Examples:
 
 The platform-specific file separator. `'\\'` or `'/'`.
 
-An example on linux:
+An example on *nix:
 
     'foo/bar/baz'.split(path.sep)
     // returns
     ['foo', 'bar', 'baz']
 
-An example on windows:
+An example on Windows:
 
     'foo\\bar\\baz'.split(path.sep)
     // returns
     ['foo', 'bar', 'baz']
+
+## path.delimiter
+
+The platform-specific path delimiter, `;` or `':'`.
+
+An example on *nix:
+
+    console.log(process.env.PATH)
+    // '/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:/usr/local/bin'
+
+    process.env.PATH.split(path.delimiter)
+    // returns
+    ['/usr/bin', '/bin', '/usr/sbin', '/sbin', '/usr/local/bin']
+
+An example on Windows:
+
+    console.log(process.env.PATH)
+    // 'C:\Windows\system32;C:\Windows;C:\Program Files\nodejs\'
+
+    process.env.PATH.split(path.delimiter)
+    // returns
+    ['C:\Windows\system32', 'C:\Windows', 'C:\Program Files\nodejs\']

lib/path.js

@@ -262,6 +262,7 @@ if (isWindows) {
   };
 
   exports.sep = '\\';
+  exports.delimiter = ';';
 
 } else /* posix */ {
 
@@ -378,6 +379,7 @@ if (isWindows) {
   };
 
   exports.sep = '/';
+  exports.delimiter = ':';
 }
 
 

test/simple/test-path.js

@@ -277,9 +277,18 @@ assert.equal(failures.length, 0, failures.join(''));
 
 // path.sep tests
 if (isWindows) {
-    // windows
-    assert.equal(path.sep, '\\');
+  // windows
+  assert.equal(path.sep, '\\');
+} else {
+  // posix
+  assert.equal(path.sep, '/');
+}
+
+// path.delimiter tests
+if (isWindows) {
+  // windows
+  assert.equal(path.delimiter, ';');
 } else {
-    // posix
-    assert.equal(path.sep, '/');
+  // posix
+  assert.equal(path.delimiter, ':');
 }