On the spherical norm of Doob and Seidel's class (Q1070057)

Let f(z) be a function meromorphic in the unit disc and define the spherical norm by \[ \| f\|_ S=\sup \{(1-| z|^ 2)| f'(z)| /(1+| f(z)|^ 2):\quad | z| <1\}. \] It is well known that \(\| f\|_ S<\infty\) if and only if f is a normal function. Here, the author investigates the spherical norm for three classes of functions. We say that f is in the Doob class D(\(\rho)\) if f is analytic for \(| z| <1\), \(f(0)=0\), and for some arc A of the unit circle with length at least \(\rho\) we have \(\limsup_{n\to \infty}| f(z_ n)| \geq 1\) whenever the sequence \(\{z_ n\}\) converges to a point of A. The author shows that if f is a function in the Doob class D(\(\rho)\) then \(\| f\|_ S\) is bounded away from 0 by a bound depending on \(\rho\) alone. Two specific lower bounds for \(\| f\|_ S\) are given, one of which is sharp for \(\rho\) near \(2\pi\) and the other bound (but not the best possible) for \(\rho\) near 0. Also, it is shown that the class I of inner functions satisfies the two equalities \[ \sup \{\| f\|_ S:\quad f\in I\}=1\quad and\quad \inf \{\| f\|_ S:\quad f\in I\}=0. \] However, if \(f\in I\) and f has at most one singular point on the unit circle, then \(\| f\|_ S\geq C_ 1\), where \(C_ 1>0\) is an absolute constant. Finally, it is shown that if f is a normal function, then \(\| f^ p\|_ S\leq p\| f\|_ S\), and that this inequality is sharp. The main tool for obtaining many of these results is a version of the two constant theorem due to \textit{O. Lehto} and \textit{K. I. Virtanen} [Acta Math. 97, 47-65 (1957; Zbl 0077.077)].