because
all the sides of a rhombus are equal. Calculate the
midpoints of the diagonals to see they are the same.
Then calculate the slopes of the diagonals. Their product
is -1 when you cash in the Pyth Theorem: (d/(c-a)) *
(d/(c+a)) = -1. Therefore the diagonals are perpendicular.
16. Place your right triangle
in the first quadrant with the right angle at the origin.
With vertices (0,0), (a,0) and (0,b), you can calculate
the coordinates of the midpoint easily: (a/2,b/2). Now
just use the distance formula on the segments from the
midpoint to each vertex. The distance is always the
sqrt(a^2 + b^2)/2.
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