Occasionally, ScaLAPACK will receive an error message from the underlying system. At this time, the BLACS will print the system error message, and exit. Since these error messages come from the underlying system, their form will necessarily vary depending on which BLACS version is being used. The user may need to obtain vendor documentation or on-line manpages describing system error messages in order to understand the message. For example, if the PVM BLACS are being used, a PVM error number will be returned. The PVM quick reference guide, for example, could then be consulted to translate the error number into an understandable error message.
Examples of system error messages can be found on the BLACS
homepage
(http://www.netlib.org/blacs/index.html) or in ``A User's
Guide to the BLACS'' [54].