refactor: replace canonicalization in search path retrieval with dedicated normalization function

[karthiknadig]

Fixes #187

[github-actions]

Performance Report (Linux) ➖

Metric	PR (P50)	PR (P95)	Baseline (P50)	Delta	Change
Server Startup	1ms	1ms	1ms	0ms	0%
Full Refresh	78ms	351ms	77ms	1ms	0%

Results based on 10 iterations. P50 = median, P95 = 95th percentile.

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Legend

• 🚀 Significant speedup (>100ms faster)
• ✅ Faster than baseline
• ➖ No significant change
• 🔺 Slower than baseline (>100ms)
• ⚠️ Significant slowdown (>500ms)

[github-actions]

Test Coverage Report (Linux)

Metric	Value
Current Coverage	58.0%
Base Branch Coverage	58.0%
Delta	0% ➖

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Coverage unchanged.

[github-actions]

Test Coverage Report (Windows)

Metric	Value
Current Coverage	54.5%
Base Branch Coverage	54.49%
Delta	0.01% ✅

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Coverage increased! Great work!

[github-actions]

Performance Report (Windows) 🚀

Metric	PR (P50)	PR (P95)	Baseline (P50)	Delta	Change
Server Startup	9ms	13ms	10ms	-1ms	-10%
Full Refresh	163ms	775ms	300ms	-137ms	-45.7%

Results based on 10 iterations. P50 = median, P95 = 95th percentile.

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Legend

• 🚀 Significant speedup (>100ms faster)
• ✅ Faster than baseline
• ➖ No significant change
• 🔺 Slower than baseline (>100ms)
• ⚠️ Significant slowdown (>500ms)

[github-actions]

Performance Report (macOS)

Metric	PR (P50)	PR (P95)	Baseline (P50)	Delta
Server Startup	72ms	496ms	71ms	1ms
Full Refresh	126ms	26868ms	158ms	-32ms

Results based on 10 iterations. P50 = median, P95 = 95th percentile.

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Legend

• 🚀 Significant speedup (>100ms faster)
• ✅ Faster than baseline
• ➖ No significant change
• 🔺 Slower than baseline (>100ms)
• ⚠️ Significant slowdown (>500ms)