Toolkit 27

Expansion (or factorization) of two binomials

a2+ab+ac+bc=(a+b)(a+c)a^2+ab+ac+bc=(a+b)(a+c)

Proof

Using the distributive law,

(a+b)(a+c)=a2+ac+ab+bc=a2+ab+ac+bc.\begin{aligned} (a+b)(a+c) &= a^2+ac+ab+bc \\ &= a^2+ab+ac+bc. \quad\square \end{aligned}