A dressmaker needs to cut 12-inch pieces of ribbon from rolls of ribbon that are 6 feet in length. How many 12-inch pieces can the dressmaker cut from 10 of these rolls of ribbon? Before you try that problem, answer the question below.
How many inches of ribbon does the dressmaker have, in total?

Best answer that i found on yahoo ok   set :   x= length of 2nd piece in cm  x- 3= length of 1st piece in cm  x-4= length of 3rd piece in cm  then since you know they all came from the 20 cm ribbon you add them together and set them equal to 20x+ x-3 +x-4 = 20  3x - 7= 20  3x= 27  x= 9  the shortest piece is the third piece which is x- 4  x-4  9-4 = 5  the length of the smallest piece is 5 cm.  the other lengths are  9 cm  6 cm