Meaning of _PC_PATH_MAX

[Don_Lewine at dgc.ceo.dg.com]

From:  Don_Lewine at dgc.ceo.dg.com

IEEE Std 1003.1-1988 paragraph 5.7.1.2 note 5 describes the value 
returned by pathconf() when _PC_PATH_MAX is used as an argument as, 
"The maximum length of a relative pathname when the specified 
directory is the working directory."
 
I have tried this on several POSIX.1 systems.  None of them seem to 
enforce the maximum.  In fact they all return a constant (say, 1024) 
even if the path given to pathconf() is already longer than that.
 
Is this conforming behavior?
 
If it is conforming, how should a portable application determine the 
longest pathname a user can specify?  
 
What about _PC_NAME_MAX?  May readdir() return a longer name than the 
value returned by pathconf() for that directory?

Volume-Number: Volume 21, Number 63