Structural properties of extended normed spaces (Q904305)

Continuing the study initiated by the first author [J. Convex Anal. 22, No. 1, 37--60 (2015; Zbl 1332.46017)] of vector spaces (over \(\mathbb R\) or \(\mathbb C\)) endowed with an extended norm \(\|\cdot\|:X\to [0,\infty]\), the authors explore in this paper a broader range of structural properties of extended normed spaces. Among other things, they {\parindent=6mm \begin{itemize} \item[{\(\bullet\)}] ``exhibit various characteristic properties of extended normed spaces, where \(X/X_{\mathrm{fin}}\) is finite-dimensional that justify the appellation almost conventional that we bestow on them; \item [{\(\bullet\)}] ``give an attractive description of the finest locally convex topology with respect to which addition and scalar multiplication are jointly continuous weaker than the extended norm topology; \item [{\(\bullet\)}] ``characterize some bornologies including the subsets of weakly compacts, and the subsets of \(X\) on which each element of \(X\) is bounded; \item [{\(\bullet\)}] ``answer a question from [loc. cit.] by showing that complemented and projection complemented closed subspaces of an extended Banach space can be different; \item [{\(\bullet\)}] ``examine the weak lower semicontinuity of distance functions and examine when the gap between a weakly compact convex set and a weakly closed convex set is attained.'' \end{itemize}} Here, \(X_{\mathrm{fin}}:=\{x\in X : \|x\|<\infty\}\) is a normed linear subspace of \(X\) and a lot of information about \(X\) can be derived from this subspace -- for instance, a linear functional \(\phi\) is continuous on \(X\) iff \(\phi|_{X_{\mathrm{fin}}}\) is continuous. As is known, in such a space the addition is jointly continuous (so that the mapping \(x\mapsto x_0+x\), \(x\in X\), is a homeomorphism), but the multiplication by scalars is not jointly continuous.