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Any vs. Either

By Maeve

I just did a double-take when reading an article about creating passport photos using Photoshop Elements and another application. Here’s what threw me:

If you have any of these two applications, then you can follow this simple do-it-yourself project…

any of these two applications

Horrors!

In speaking of two applications, the word either is called for:

If you have either of these two applications.

If, however, one is talking about three or more applications, one may say:

If you have any of the photo editing applications available these days, you can….

NOTE:
either = one or the other; from OE hwaether, each of two
any = one indifferently out of more than two

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Full post as published by Daily Writing Tips on March 04, 2008 (boomark / email).