1) 1D9 means you roll one 9-sided dice. 2D10 would mean rolling two 10-sided dice. One of the most common dice is a d20.
2) 'Fraid not... You've played Runescape, haven't you?
3) Not really, no. However, some quests have a time limit. Don't worry too much about this, as only a small fraction of quests are affected by time.
4) Hmmm... Are you patched up to the latest version?
And welcome to Ironworks!