Question 529799: The length of a rectangle exceeds the width by 2cm. If the diagonal is 10cm long, find the width of the rectangle. Found 2 solutions by jim_thompson5910, swincher4391:Answer by jim_thompson5910(35256) (Show Source):
You can put this solution on YOUR website! Let l and w be the length and width respectively. Let d be the diagonal.
l = w+2
Then look at this diagram:
Notice we have a right triangle.
Then w^2 + (w+2)^2 = (10)^2
w^2 + w^2 + 4w + 4 = 100
2w^2 + 4w -96 = 0
2(w^2 + 2w - 48) = 0
2(w+8)(w-6) = 0
w = -8 and w = 6
Can't have a negative width, so w=6.
Thus our width is 6cm.