How can I efficiently scrub Ruby's negative zero float?

Question

In Ruby, 0.0 * -1 == -0.0.

I have an application where I multiply a bunch of Float objects with -1, but I don't like the -0.0 in the output, since it's confusing.

Is there a smart way of making Float#to_s output 0.0 instead of -0.0?

I'm completely fine with running every Float object through some kind of scrubber/helper method, but the following just tends to make me even more confused:

def clean_output(amount)
  if amount.zero?
    0.0
  else
    amount
  end
end

UPDATE:

To be more precise on what I'm looking for, I want a solution that I can run on a whole bunch of floats, some of which will be negative, some positive. The negative ones should remain negative unless they're negative zeroes, i.e. -0.0.

Examples:

clean_output(-0.0) #=>  0.0
clean_output(-3.0) #=> -3.0
clean_output(3.0)  #=>  3.0

Answer 1

There is actually a solution which does not require a condition.

def clean_output(value)
  value + 0
end

output:

> clean_output(3.0)
=> 3.0 
> clean_output(-3.0)
=> -3.0 
> clean_output(-0.0)
=> 0.0

I don't actually like this solution better than the one I accepted, because of lack of clarity. If I'd see this in a piece of code I didn't write myself, I'd wonder why you'd want to add zero to everything.

It does solve the problem though, so I thought I'd share it here anyway.