Counting the number of entities in a location or passing by is considered a rudimentary skill. However, once you get past a certain amount of items (for example people or animals) in an area, add in an occasional distraction and all of a sudden you may start to wonder if you were at a value of X, or was it X-1, or perhaps even Y or Z.
To avert these numerical inaccuracies, and allow you to practice your surface mount and through-hole soldering skills – you might consider the Digital Tally Counter by Making Devices. The counter features a 4-digit, 7-segment display panel counts up to 9999, and a set of green and red buttons that increment and decrement the count respectively.
As shown in the video below, the buzzer optionally beeps when the count is changed, and a long press on the red button resets the count to zero. After 60 seconds, the device goes to sleep to save power, keeping the numerical value stored.
A PIC18LF14K50 low power microcontroller runs the device, allowing it to draw ~50 nanoamps when asleep, virtually negligible unless you plan to pick it up in a few hundred years. Active usage will get you in the 30-35 hour range, plenty of time accurately keeping track of… anything! The device can be ordered as a kit with only the µC soldered on, or fully assembled if you just need to get counting!
More info on the device can be found on this Hackaday.io post.
source https://blog.tindie.com/2021/09/digital-tally-counter/
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