Re: Wrong behavior of CrossProduct
- To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
- Subject: [mg7977] Re: [mg7958] Wrong behavior of CrossProduct
- From: David Withoff <withoff>
- Date: Wed, 30 Jul 1997 02:37:48 -0400
- Sender: owner-wri-mathgroup at wolfram.com
Hello, > How Mathematica implement the Cross Product of two vectors? > > As far as I know the basic definition of the Cross Product between >two vectors in ANY ORTHOGONAL coordinated system is as follows: > >(a1,a2,a3)X(b1,b2,b3) = (a2*b3 - a3*b2, > a3*b1 - a1*b3, > a1*b2 - a2*b1) I think that this definition applies only to cartesian coordinate systems. It is very common, however, especially in describing vector fields, to use a locally cartesian coordinate system even when the host coordinate system is not cartesian. Dave Withoff Wolfram Research