Control Main swf through external swf..

Question

ok, this is a tough one for me.....
ive figured out timeline transitions, and timeline based preloaders......so now i have a problem.....
i have my MAIN swf file that i load all my pages in externally ( external swf files )....
when i click a button ( for example ) my "about us" button - the transition begins....
i have a keyframe with the following code on frame 40 ( inside a movie clip named "pages" in my main SWF where all the buttons/transitions are ):
var Xpos:Number=0;
var Ypos:Number=0;
var swf:MovieClip;
var bgloader:Loader = new Loader();
var bgURL
if(page==1){
bgURL=new URLRequest("pages/home.swf");
if(page==2){
bgURL=new URLRequest("pages/about.swf");
if(page==3){
bgURL=new URLRequest("pages/updates.swf");
if(page==4){
bgURL=new URLRequest("pages/contact.swf");
bgloader.load(bgURL);
bgloader.x=Xpos;
bgloader.y=Ypos;
bg.addChild(bgloader);
stop();
now as you can see, at the end it stops...and this is because my external swf files have timeline preloaders in them.....
now on frame 41 of my main swf, i created a label called "start" which i need to target from my external pages....
on all my external swfs i have this code on frame 2( and this is where i am having the problem ):
if(framesLoaded==80){
      MovieClip(parent).gotoAndPlay("start");
else if(framesLoaded<80){
     gotoAndPlay(1);
now, where i have MovieClip(parent).gotoAndPlay("start"); - i am trying to target my MAIN swf files timeline ( which is inside a movie clip on the main timeline called "pages").
however, it doesnt work....i cannot get my external swf to communicate correctly for some reason.....
how do i code my external swf files to know that once frame 80 has loaded on them, that it needs to direct my MAIN swf file to gotoAndPlay("start"); ??
im hoping someone can help here....

Answer 1

You may not need all of what you're trying to accomplish if you are just waiting for the swf to load before you command the main timeline to move along.  If you assign a listener to the loader you can determine when the file is loaded and ready to run without having the file figure that out itself and tell you about it.  Just add an INIT listener to your loader...
bgloader.contentLoaderInfo.addEventListener(Event.INIT,  eventHandler);
That line of code will have your main timeline waiting to call that eventHandler function until the loader content (your swf) indicates that it is loaded and ready for action.
So all you might need is (meaning no code is needed in your loaded swf's)...
stop();
var Xpos:Number=0;
var Ypos:Number=0;
var swf:MovieClip;
var bgloader:Loader = new Loader();
var bgURL;
if(page==1){
bgURL=new URLRequest("pages/home.swf");
if(page==2){
bgURL=new URLRequest("pages/about.swf");
if(page==3){
bgURL=new URLRequest("pages/updates.swf");
if(page==4){
bgURL=new URLRequest("pages/contact.swf");
bgloader.contentLoaderInfo.addEventListener(Event.INIT,  initHandler);
bgloader.load(bgURL);
bgloader.x=Xpos;
bgloader.y=Ypos;
bg.addChild(bgloader);
function initHandler(event:Event):void {
    gotoAndPlay(41);
Taking one step back to what you tried just so the intentions of that solution aren't wasted... the missing link in your attempt was neglecting to add a listener for the load completion that would have called the loaderCompleteHandler function...
bgloader.contentLoaderInfo.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE,  loaderCompleteHandler);