Question #0ea77

1 Answer
Azimet
Jan 20, 2018

Knowing the leg with length #10# is the hypotenuse, then yes, it is as you put it.

Explanation:

If #a# is the hypotenuse (longest leg, opposite the right angle) of a right triangle, for the lengths of the other two legs, the pythagorean theorem states that #a^2=b^2+c^2#. In your case, the most likely answer is that the remaining leg is #6#, as you described.

But there's a chance the remaining leg is actually the hypotenuse (if not already specified of course) in which case we would have that

#x=sqrt(10^2+8^2)=sqrt(164)=2sqrt(41)#

Don't let the above bother you as much, there's probably an implication somewhere in the problem that the leg of length #10# is the longest. Check if it's mentioned, or if it's the leg opposite the right angle.

EDIT: Noticing your question again, you actually said "the leg of a right angle"...so I guess you can disregard anything below the first paragraph.

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