Rapid transition is the most important feature introduced by 802.1w. The legacy STA passively waited for the network to converge before it turned a port into the forwarding state. The achievement of faster convergence was a matter of tuning the conservative default parameters (forward delay and max_age timers) and often put the stability of the network at stake. The new rapid STP is able to actively confirm that a port can safely transition to the forwarding state without having to rely on any timer configuration. There is now a real feedback mechanism that takes place between RSTP-compliant bridges. In order to achieve fast convergence on a port, the protocol relies upon two new variables: edge ports and link type.