[Tex/LaTex] Customizing TOC in beamer sidebar (with a custom theme)

beamertable of contentsthemes

I have a beamer presentation with a sidebar and the table of content is too long to fit, like this guy. The difference is that I am using a custom theme (just a color-modified Boadilla, so the following MWE does the same:


\documentclass[a4paper]{beamer}

\usetheme{Boadilla} % load `/usr/share/texlive/texmf-dist/tex/latex/beamer/themes/theme/beamerthemeBoadilla.sty`
\useoutertheme[left]{sidebar}

\title{PhD stuff}
\author{Me \textsc{Myself}}
\date{\today}

\begin{frame}[plain]{}
    \titlepage
\end{frame}

\begin{frame}[plain, allowframebreaks]
    \tableofcontents
\end{frame}

\section{Introduction}
\subsection{The genetics of speciation}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Models of diversification}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Consequences of gene duplication}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Fates of gene duplicates}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Population genetics models for the fate of gene duplicates}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{How to narrow down the topic?}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}

\section{Date gene duplications}
\subsection{Method: infer synonymous substitution rates}
\subsubsection{pipeline}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Method: convert synonymous substitution rates to million years}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Method: data pre-filtering}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{A methodological bias?}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}

\section{Evaluating hypothetical bias}
\subsection{Do some gene trees have ``incorrect'' branch lengths?}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Unequal branch lengths biasing MPL?}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Wrong codeml computation?}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Are input tree topologies wrong?}
\subsubsection{Which distance measure is best? treebest VS codeml dS}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}

\section[Correlation between duplication and diversification]{Next: phylogenetic
\subsection{Existing phylogenetic correlation tools}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsubsection{trait VS trait}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsubsection{trait VS tree (diversification)}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}

\end{document}

I would like to avoid putting the code in the presentation itself (as suggested here), but rather inside the theme, in order to be reusable.

What do I need to add in my beamertheme file to either:

Only display subsections of the current section, like solution 2 here, using the equivalent of \tableofcontents[currentsection, hideothersubsections]?
Progressively "scroll down" the TOC as I progress through the talk, to center on the current section-subsection?

Thanks in advance for any help/suggestion 🙂

Best Answer

How about using \useoutertheme[hideothersubsections,left]{sidebar}? This will only show the subsections of the current section.

\documentclass[a4paper]{beamer}

\usetheme{Boadilla}
\useoutertheme[hideothersubsections,left]{sidebar}

\title{PhD stuff}
\author{Me \textsc{Myself}}
\date{\today}

\begin{document}

\begin{frame}[plain]{}
    \titlepage
\end{frame}

\begin{frame}[plain, allowframebreaks]
    \tableofcontents
\end{frame}

\section{Introduction}
\subsection{The genetics of speciation}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Models of diversification}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Consequences of gene duplication}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Fates of gene duplicates}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Population genetics models for the fate of gene duplicates}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{How to narrow down the topic?}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}

\section{Date gene duplications}
\subsection{Method: infer synonymous substitution rates}
\subsubsection{pipeline}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Method: convert synonymous substitution rates to million years}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Method: data pre-filtering}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{A methodological bias?}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}

\section{Evaluating hypothetical bias}
\subsection{Do some gene trees have ``incorrect'' branch lengths?}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Unequal branch lengths biasing MPL?}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Wrong codeml computation?}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsection{Are input tree topologies wrong?}
\subsubsection{Which distance measure is best? treebest VS codeml dS}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}

\section[Correlation between duplication and diversification]{Next: phylogenetic}
\subsection{Existing phylogenetic correlation tools}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsubsection{trait VS trait}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}
\subsubsection{trait VS tree (diversification)}\begin{frame}{}\end{frame}

\end{document}

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] Customizing Beamer’s Table of Contents

For specific subsections you may modify the behavior before they start: you could change \AtBeginSubsection locally. This means you could change that, for a subsection, but keep this change local by enclosing it within a group. For example, disabling \AtBeginSubsection and thus the subsection TOC:

\begingroup
\AtBeginSubsection{}
\subsection{No TOC}
\begin{frame}
...
\end{frame}
\endgroup
\subsection{Here's a TOC}

After the group ended, the globally by \AtBeginSubsection defined macro returns being active. The following subsections will show the TOC - I tested it.

This works because \AtBeginSubsection uses \def to redefine internal macros, which works local, thus visible only inside a group, in contrary to \gdef.

[Tex/LaTex] Customizing the sidebar in beamer

The following code contains the necessary redefinitions:

\documentclass{beamer}
\usetheme{Marburg}

\makeatletter
  \setbeamertemplate{sidebar \beamer@sidebarside}
  {
    \beamer@tempdim=\beamer@sidebarwidth%
    \advance\beamer@tempdim by -6pt%
    \vskip4em%
    \insertverticalnavigation{\beamer@sidebarwidth}%
    \vfill
    \ifx\beamer@sidebarside\beamer@lefttext%
    \else%
      \usebeamercolor{normal text}%
      \llap{\usebeamertemplate***{navigation symbols}\hskip0.1cm}%
      \vskip2pt%
    \fi%
  }%

  \ifx\beamer@sidebarside\beamer@lefttext%
    \defbeamertemplate*{sidebar right}{sidebar theme}
    {%
      \vfill%
      \llap{\usebeamertemplate***{navigation symbols}\hskip0.1cm}%
      \vskip2pt}
  \fi

\setbeamertemplate{section in sidebar}%{sidebar theme}
{%
  \vbox{%
    \vskip1ex%
    \beamer@sidebarformat{3pt}{section in sidebar}{\insertsectionheadnumber
~\insertsectionhead}%
  }%
}
\setbeamertemplate{section in sidebar shaded}%{sidebar theme}
{%
  \vbox{%
    \vskip1ex%
    \beamer@sidebarformat{3pt}{section in sidebar shaded}{\insertsectionheadnumber
~\insertsectionhead}%
  }%
}
\makeatother

\title{Some title}
\author{author}
\institute{my workplace}
\date{\today}

\AtBeginSection[]
{
  \begin{frame}
    \frametitle{Table of Contents}
    \tableofcontents[currentsection,currentsubsection]
  \end{frame}
}

\begin{document}

\begin{frame}
\titlepage
\end{frame}

\section[Outline]{First Section}
\frame{\tableofcontents}

\section{Introduction}

\begin{frame}
\frametitle{Basics}
\begin{itemize}
\item A
\pause
\item B
\pause
\item C
\end{itemize}
\end{frame}

\subsection{More basics}

\begin{frame}
\frametitle{something goes here}
more stuff
\end{frame}

\section{My work}

\begin{frame}
my stuff...
\end{frame}

\end{document}

An image of the first slide:

enter image description here

Best Answer

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] Customizing Beamer’s Table of Contents

[Tex/LaTex] Customizing the sidebar in beamer

Related Question