A cooking appliance can include diagnostic information communication ability. The cooking appliance has a support for supporting a cooking vessel at a cooking location. A heating element is configured to heat the cooking vessel at the cooking location. A user interface of the cooking appliance includes a visible indicator that is operable to convey primary operational information indicative of an operational aspect of the cooking appliance to a user during normal operation of the cooking appliance. A controller receives sensed information indicative of a malfunction of the cooking appliance and controls an operation of the visible indicator to display an error signal that is incomprehensible to the user without computer assistance, but is readable by a portable code reader. The error signal comprises repeated illumination and deactivation of the visible indicator at a predetermined frequency.
