how can i put a timer on a flash document , going down?

just make each slid last a second long i would say

so like if you counting down from 10

u make 10 slides with the number 1 - 10(and maybe 11 if thers a 0)

then make each show for 1 sec

then make it stop once it's dune(btw i know nothing about flash and just started learn a tiny bit today)

Say you have a variable called 'mynumber'.
Say you want to count down from 10
you might want to insert a dynamic textbox displaying 'mynumber'.
Then on the first frame of your movie, you have this bit of actionscript:

if (mynumber == undefined) {
mynumber = 10;
}

Then on the frame you want to count down, you put:

if (mynumber>= 0) {
mynumber --;
}

And every time you come back to that frame, it will deduct one from your counter, until it's 0.
good luck!