SOLUTION: When you measured your diagonal clothesline across your rectangular porch, you found that it was 1 foot longer than the length of the porch, and 8 ft longer than the width. What ar

Question 218394: When you measured your diagonal clothesline across your rectangular porch, you found that it was 1 foot longer than the length of the porch, and 8 ft longer than the width. What are the dimensions of your porch?
Found 2 solutions by checkley77, josmiceli:
Answer by checkley77(12844) (Show Source): You can put this solution on YOUR website!
(x-1)^2+(x-8)^2=x^2
x^2-2x+1+x^2-16x+64=x^2
2x^2-x^2-18x+65=0
x^2-18x+65=0
(x-13)(x-5)=0
x-13=0
x=13 ft. for the diagonal.
Proof:
(13-1)^2+(13-8)^2=13^2
12^2+5^2=169
169=169

Answer by josmiceli(19441) (Show Source): You can put this solution on YOUR website!
Let = diagonal
Let = width
Let = length

given:

----------------
This is 3 equations and 3 unknowns, so it's solvable

Use the quadratic formula

Right away I see that won't work, since
ft can't be ft longer than width, so

and

The dimensions of the porch are 12' x 5'

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