Somebody is insisting that calling rectangular prisms “rectangular solids” just isn’t right. I hold that you don’t change names any more often than necessary, and that when you say “prism” *most* people think of the triangular, light-bending kind and even when you say “rectangular prism,” well, I might think a triangular prism is rectangular because it does have rectangles in it.
This person says that because “solid” could mean a glob of clay, therefore “rectangular solid” isn’t precise enough.
Welp, all the definitions I see of rectangular solids state that all the sides have to be rectangles.
None of them include a rectangle with a glob of clay on top.
Nobody associates “rectangular solid” with blobs of clay.
Lots and lots of people associate prism with triangles.
Why invite confusion?
Resource Room Dot Net Blog 
howardat58
April 21, 2015
Confusion alright !
Mathematically speaking, a prism is anything with identical polygonal ends and rectangular sides, so a triangular prism is the one people always think of, a rectangular prism used to be called a cuboid, and whatever happened to spheroids?
Anyway, this is merely an opinion.
The Queen of Hearts rules !
Rachel
April 21, 2015
…I think most of my students are more likely to associate the word “prism” with the sound-alike “prison” than with triangles…