We prove that any subset of $\overline {\mathbb {Q}}^m$ (closed under complex conjugation and which contains the origin) is the exceptional set of uncountably many transcendental entire functions over $\mathbb {C}^m$ with rational coefficients. This result solves a several variables version of a question posed by Mahler for transcendental entire functions [Lectures on Transcendental Numbers, Lecture Notes in Mathematics, 546 (Springer-Verlag, Berlin, 1976)].

It is shown that any subset of can be the exceptional set of some transcendental entire function. Furthermore, we give a much more general version of this theorem and present a unified proof.

Several “classical” results on algebraic complete lattices extend to algebraic posets and, more generally, to so called compactly generated posets; but, of course, there may arise difficulties in the absence of certain joins or meets. For example, the property of weak atomicity turns out to be valid in all Dedekind complete compactly generated posets, but not in arbitrary algebraic posets. The compactly generated posets are, up to isomorphism, the inductive centralized systems, where a system of sets is called centralized if it contains all point closures. A similar representation theorem holds for algebraic posets; it is known that every algebraic poset is isomorphic to the system i(Q) of all directed lower sets in some poset Q; we show that only those posets P which satisfy the ascending chain condition are isomorphic to their own “up-completion” i(P). We also touch upon a few structural aspects such as the formation of direct sums, products and substructures. The note concludes with several applications of a generalized version of the Birkhoff Frink decomposition theorem for algebraic lattices.