v0.3.86: extended norm_path() helper function to substitute MS Windows path separators

M  .gitignore
M  .gitlab-ci.yml
M  CONTRIBUTING.rst
M  LICENSE.md
M  README.md
M  SECURITY.md
M  ae/base.py
M  dev_requirements.txt
M  pyproject.toml
M  setup.py
M  tests/conftest.py
M  tests/requirements.txt
M  tests/test_base.py