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A cylinder has a circular cross section, a rectangular prism has a rectangular cross section.
The vertical cross section of a right vertical cone is a triangle if that cross section is taken from the vertex. Any other vertical cross section will reveal a hyperbola (with endpoints on the base of the cone). A link can be found below.
They are similar, however, the distinctiion is that the pyramid has a rectangular base with triangular faces meeting in a vertex (thus forming the pyramid shape), while the prism has a congruent (identical) cross-section, like a loaf of bread. So the prism has two rectangular "ends".
rectangle
a square