We examine the diverse ways Brahmagupta (628 CE), Mahāvīra (ca. 850), Śrīdhara (ca. 750-900) and their commentators understood how a multiplication could be executed. We describe a variety of algorithms, noting how commentators give us clues to how numbers are shaped for execution, how the procedure is displayed on a working surface, etc. We attempt to evaluate if resources of the decimal place-value notation are used. The current historiography of elementary operations in Sanskrit sources is also revised along the way.