Drag points A and B to change the length and the direction of vectors [b][i]u[/i][/b] and [b][i]v[/i][/b]. What do you observe?

Graphically, the cross product of vectors [b][i]u[/i][/b] and [b][i]v[/i][/b] is a vector perpendicular to the plane containing them. In the applet above, this is represented by vector [b][i]w[/i][/b]. Also, the magnitude of vector [i][b]w[/b][/i] is equal to the area of the parallelogram with [b][i]u[/i][/b] and [b][i]v[/i][/b] as sides.