main() return 1;

I think the title pretty much says it all, it seems my book seemed to skip one little detail. It explained that main returns normally with a return of zero. It never specified what happens when main returns a one. Instead the author just started returning 1 like I new what it meant and from what it looks like a return of one seems to accomplish the same thing as a continue or something like that.

When passing a return value from a main method it is for the 'calling application' to pick this up much like you can do something with the return value of any function in your own application. Usually this calling application is the Operating System and your return value really just gets ignored. But if your application was started in a BAT file or by another application, that could then pick up that value and do something based on the value it receives.

return 0 usually indicates nothing happened (success) while any other number is up to the programmer to define. (1 = error in startup, 2=something went wrong in function a, 3=Out of memory, 4=user is an idiot etc etc )

Sorta goes against a normal 'true/false' bool return you may encounter in most programs and some people choose to follow that convention instead so they return '0' (False) or negative numbers if the program encountered an error and 1 (true) for success but the other way around is more common.