Launching Mutliple Applications

Hi all,

I've scanned the forums and googled till my eyes hurt and can't find a solution for this, so can anyone help...

I've built a flash/CF application that creates online courses and then can export the data into XML and relevant sub folders, along with a "run course.exe" so it can be run locally. I've a load of these courses written and exported - all in their own subdirectories under the main "training" directory - but now want to build a "launcher" in flash. In a nutshell, a load of buttons that will run the exe's that are in the subs.

I've used Fscommand("exec"... to try and launch the courses, but this has certain limitations namely that the "executable" needs to be in an fscommand folder...however, all my executables look in subdirs that have the same name, so they need to be in subs of their own...which fscommand doesn't like. So my dir structure at the moment is like this

c:\Training
c:\Training\fscommand
c:\Training\fscommand\course1 <--- exe in here
c:\Training\fscommand\course1\images
c:\Training\fscommand\course1\xml
c:\Training\fscommand\course1\video
c:\Training\fscommand\course2 <--- exe in here
c:\Training\fscommand\course2\images
c:\Training\fscommand\course2\xml
c:\Training\fscommand\course2\video
...etc

To get around this, i've created batch files that effectively run the exe in the subs (course1, course2)...BUT that means I'm left with a Command window open until the user finishes with the course - very nasty!

So...is there an alternative to using fscommand in a local environment that will run from any location given? I'm using Flash 8.
I've looked at ExternalInterface, but can't get my head around it, and don't even know if it will do the job.

Many thanks
Phil