Existence of unity in Lehmer's \(\psi\)-product ring. II. (Q1860667)

If \(T\) is a non-empty subset of the set \(\mathbb{N}\times \mathbb{N}\), where \(\mathbb{N}\) denotes the set of positive integers, \(\psi:T\times T\to \mathbb{N}\) is a map with the property that the equation \(\psi(x,y)=n\) has for every \(n\) finitely many solutions, then Lehmer's \(\psi\)-convolution of arithmetic functions \(f,g\) is defined by \(f\psi g=\sum_{\psi(x,y)=n}f(x)g(y)\). If the \(\psi\)-convolution is commutative and associative, then the set of all arithmetic functions forms a ring \(F\) under usual addition and the \(\psi\)-convolution as the product. The authors prove that \(F\) contains a unit element if and only if the map \(\psi\) is surjective. This has been known earlier only under the additional condition \(\psi(x,y)\geq\max\{x,y\}\) [the second author, Indian J. Pure Appl. Math. 20, 1184--1190 (1989; Zbl 0698.10004)]. It is shown moreover that if \( \psi\) preserves multiplicativity and is surjective, then the unit element is multiplicative.