Why doesn't this simple JavaScript increment and decrement method work?

(function() {
    var count = {
        digit: 0,
        increment: function() {
            var interval = setInterval(function() {
                if (++count.digit == 10) {
                    clearInterval(interval);
            开发者_如何学C        count.decrement();
                }
                var update = document.getElementById("liveUpdate");
                update.innerHTML = count.digit;
            }, 500);
        },
        decrement: function() {
            var interval = setInterval(function() {
                if (--count.digit == -1) {
                    clearInterval(interval);
                }
            }, 500);
        }
    };
    count.increment();
})();

It stops but it doesn't go down? What could be the problem?

Your decrement function never updates the output anywhere. The variable is going down but you don't show that on screen.

Try (or check the corresponding JSFiddle):

(function() {
    var update = document.getElementById("liveUpdate");
    var count = {
        digit: 0,
        increment: function() {
            var interval = setInterval(function() {
                if (++count.digit == 10) {
                    clearInterval(interval);
                    count.decrement();
                }
                update.innerHTML = count.digit;
            }, 500);
        },
        decrement: function() {
            var interval = setInterval(function() {
                if (--count.digit == -1) {
                    clearInterval(interval);
                }
                update.innerHTML = count.digit;
            }, 500);
        }
    };
    count.increment();
})();

setInterval will call the function every 500 seconds. It will not stop until you stop it. You can read more about stopping it at Stop setInterval call in JavaScript

It't not a bug, it's a feature ;-). setInterval() runs the given function in a loop with a given interval (500 ms). See this article for details.