Patent ID: 8787155

Claim:
An apparatus comprising: a network component of a network configured to perform a method, the method comprising: detecting by the network component that a malfunction associated with the network component has occurred, the network component configured to be coupled to a link that becomes non-operational due to the malfunction, the link designed for automatic link recovery, the network being based on an architecture having an explicit architectural specification defining the architecture, the architectural specification specifying, that automatic link recovery is to be performed based on the malfunction, the automatic link recovery designed to delay a predetermined amount of time prior to confirming there is a malfunction; and reporting the malfunction to another network component, the reporting to alert of the malfunction and to indicate that recovery is to be attempted, and wherein the reporting comprises:, asserting by the network component a sideband error signal to report the malfunction, the sideband error signal being coupled to the output of the network component and an input of the another network component and the sideband error signal being non-architected in that it is not a part of the architectural specification, the asserting comprising setting an indicator in a position of a status register of the another network component to a defined value, the position corresponding to the sideband error signal for the network component, and wherein the reporting bypasses the automatic link recovery which is an architected feature specified in the architectural specification, and wherein the reporting is performed absent waiting the predetermined amount of time for the automatic link recovery to confirm the malfunction.