Showing a Five-Year-Old What Counting to a Billion Feels Like, Using Lovable

Harshal
2 hours ago
2 min read

Build notes for a counting webapp using Lovable AI

Software can show a five-year-old what counting to a billion feels like in minutes instead of a lifetime. Here is how I used Lovable to build an app that solves that gap at home.

I spent 30 minutes building this and 20 minutes writing this. You need 1 minute to read this.

Problem Context

While introducing AI, software, and coding to my five-year-old, I picked up a project to solve a recurring conversation at our home. He kept asking the adults in the house whether we knew how to count to one million, 1 billion, 99 quadrillion, and so on.

We wanted him to understand that grown-ups know how to count that high. He would not believe us unless we started and completed the counting. None of us wanted to keep counting for a lifetime. The hard part was explaining that counting that far would take longer than a human lifetime. I decided that software could count fast enough to show him.

He and I built and tested the solution together.

Solution Via App

The app lives here: count-numbers-up-fast.lovable.app

Video walkthrough:

The app solves the belief problem by counting faster than humans can. Enter the target number and press Go. The app counts to it. Adjust the speed or use the default. The default is 33 frames per second, the rate at which human eyes perceive smooth motion. The display transitions smoothly from digit to digit. Any faster and the digits blur.

Built using Lovable.

Learnings

Changes I had to make:

Kid-friendly design: I told the AI to tailor the look and feel for a five-year-old.
Mobile: I prompted the AI for a mobile-friendly layout.
Auto-resizing: The text box was too small for large numbers like one million or one billion. I added auto-resizing.
Pause but no resume: The AI added a pause button but not a resume control.
Scientific notation: Scientific notation (e.g. 1E9) is handy for large numbers, but I skipped it to keep the app kid-friendly.

The app turned an abstract idea (counting to a billion) into something our five-year-old could watch and grasp in minutes.