Order of operations for dot/cross product

[cos(e)]

just say i get a.bxc where x is cross product, and a,b,c are vectors, does it matter if i do the dot before the cross product?

 

[Hurkyl]

Try it both ways...

 

[Knissp]

In short, yes.

Remember that based on the definitions: (1) the dot product of two vectors returns a scalar, and (2) the cross product of two vectors returns a vector.

(That's why the dot product is also known as the scalar product and the cross product is also known as the vector product, by the way.)

Which way would the triple product you pose then have to be defined?