Great question! Let's break down exactly why this happens—it all boils down to operating system limits on exit codes and how Python (and your IDE) handles out-of-range values.

Here's the breakdown: #

• Operating systems restrict exit code ranges
  Most OSes don’t let you use arbitrary large numbers as exit codes:

  • On Unix-like systems (Linux, macOS), exit codes are 8-bit unsigned integers, so they can only be between 0 and 255. Any number outside this range gets modulo 256 applied (e.g., -1 becomes 255, 257 becomes 1).
  • On Windows, exit codes are 32-bit signed integers, which means they can only range from -2147483648 to 2147483647. Your value -992340374290374 is way smaller than the minimum valid value here—way beyond what a 32-bit integer can hold. This causes an integer overflow, turning your number into an invalid, unrecognizable value for the OS.

• Python/IDE behavior with invalid exit codes
  When you pass an out-of-range value to sys.exit(), Python tries to truncate it to fit the OS's allowed range, but the result is often an invalid state. IDEs like PyCharm (which your error message looks like it's from) will often interpret these invalid/unexpected exit codes as a generic -1 to indicate an unspecified error.

Quick test to confirm: #

If you run sys.exit(-123) (a value within the 32-bit signed range) on Windows, you'll see the correct exit code -123 in your IDE. Only when you pass values way outside the valid range do you get the generic -1 fallback.

内容的提问来源于stack exchange，提问作者Toothpick Anemone