How To Multiply Matrices Quickly and Correctly in Six Easy Steps

Step 0–Make Sure the product makes sense! Say we’re given two matrices A and B, where and we’ve been asked to find the product AB. To see if AB makes sense, write down the sizes of the matrices in the positions you want to multiply them. In this case, we write To check that the product makes sense, simply check if the two numbers on the inside agree. If they do, the product can be taken, if they don’t agree, the product doesn’t make sense. For instance, even though the product AB makes sense, the product BA does not. Indeed, the inside numbers of don’t match up. Step 1–If the product makes sense, find the dimensions of your answer Again, we can make use of the technique of writing down the dimensions in order. Let’s take the same A and B from above. We write down The outside numbers, in order, give the dimensions of the product. Reading the outside numbers left to right, we get 1 Ãâ€" 3, which is the dimension of or the product AB. We’ll compute this ourselves in a minute! To recap, †¢ Write down the dimensions of the two matrices A and B. †¢ Check if the inside numbers agree. †¢ If they agree, read the dimensions of the answer off the outside numbers Special Case – Multiplying a row vector by a matrix Step 2 –Write out the rows of the matrix on the right In our example, we would write Make sure you write them in the order they appeared! Step 3 – Multiplication Multiply the first row of B by the first entry of A, the second row by the second entry, and so on. which equals Step 4 – Addition Add up the rows you got in step 3 to get your answer General Case -- Two Matrices Now let's say we want to multiply a new matrix A' by the same matrix B, where Doing steps 0 and 1, we see the product makes sense and the output should be 3 X 3. We'll find the output row by row. Step 5 –Break both matrices into rows In our example, we would write Step 6 –Repeat Steps 1-4 for each row of A' To find the first row of our 3x3 answer, compute the product, the first row of A' times B. which is the problem we just solved. So, the first row of our answer is To find the second row of our 3x3 answer, compute, which I'll leave the reader to verify is Finally, the third row of our 3x3 answer is, so we multiply and then add We've found the three rows of our solution matrix and we conclude The common way of stating this perspective is that in the multiplication of AB, A acts on B by row operations. We view B as a collection of row vectors and the rows of A have us take linear combinations of the row vectors in B to form the rows of the solution. There is an equivalent perspective of column operations. Each has their place. Stay tuned for a follow-up post about how each of these perspectives comes into play when solving the matrix equation Ax = b. Are you interested in connecting with a mathematics tutor like Jesse? ;