sign

Generic Description

Returns the direction of a number as negative, zero, or positive. It is documented separately because numeric transforms change ranking, thresholds, and buckets in ways planner tools must not guess.

Simple example:

RETURN sign(-12) AS value

Consumer-Level Explanation

Use it when direction matters but the exact magnitude will be handled elsewhere. Prefer this function when the transformation is a deliberate part of the model or report, and name the derived value in a WITH stage when it will be reused.

More Detailed Explanation

sign is scalar math, so it is evaluated per row after graph patterns, procedure output, or map projections have produced values. Keep it close to the query when thresholds, ranking, and derived fields need to be auditable and reproducible.

Advanced Example

This example applies sign to a named score component after matching graph data, making the derived metric reviewable before ordering.

MATCH (d:Document)
WITH d, properties(d).prize - 2.5 AS priority_delta
RETURN d.title AS document,
       sign(priority_delta) AS priority_direction,
       abs(priority_delta) AS priority_distance
ORDER BY priority_distance DESC

Real Use Cases

• distance-from-target scoring
• numeric bucketing and normalization before ORDER BY or aggregation
• making scoring formulas visible to query review and assistant tooling

Real Limitations And Tradeoffs

• invalid numeric inputs produce null-like results rather than a repaired value
• math functions do not fix poor feature scaling; choose transformations intentionally
• nondeterministic functions such as random sampling are not appropriate for persisted decisions