[Tex/LaTex] How to reproduce this beautiful table of contents

table of contents

I stumbled upon this TOC today:

The sample TOC

I really like its structure and simplicity. The page numbers are right behind the entries, and not unnecessarily remote as they often are. The separation between chapter numbering on the left and titles on the right clearly sets the two apart.

I would like to reproduce this design for a book, but have no idea where to start. Can you show me how to reproduce this?

Bonus
Do you have any idea how this could be extended to also list sections, and remove the authors?

Best Answer

Use etoc.

The update enables sections in the TOC (see below for the first answer). Furthermore, it uses \chaptername, \partname (available in the book class) for internationalization. And it uses a non-breakable space before the page number.

\documentclass{book}
\usepackage{etoc}
\etocsetlevel{authors}{1}
\etocsetlevel{section}{2}
\etocsetlevel{subsection}{3}
\etocsettocdepth{section}
\newcommand{\authorstotoc}[1]{\etoctoccontentsline{authors}{#1}}

\newlength{\tocleft}
\setlength{\tocleft}{3cm}

\newlength{\tocsep}
\setlength{\tocsep}{2em}


\etocsetstyle{part}{}{}{{\bfseries\makebox[0pt][r]
                              {\partname\ \etocnumber\hspace{\tocsep}}%
                     \etocname\kern1em\relax\etocpage\par}\vspace{3ex}}{}

% to avoid possible line breaks between chapter (or part) name and page number
% replace \quad by \kern1em\relax

\etocsetstyle{chapter}{}{}{\etocifnumbered
                             {\makebox[0pt][r]
                               {\chaptername\ \etocnumber\hspace{\tocsep}}}
                             {\ifcase\TEMP
                              \def\TEMP{1}\or\def\TEMP{2}%
                              \makebox[0pt][r]
                                  {\parbox[t]{\dimexpr\tocleft-\tocsep\relax}
                                   {\raggedleft Introductory\\ \strut \chaptername}%
                                   \hspace{\tocsep}}\fi
                              }\textbf{\etocname\kern1em\relax\etocpage}\par
                             \etocifnumbered{}{\vspace{2ex}}}{}

\etocsetstyle{authors}{}{}{\etocname\par\vspace{1ex}}{\vspace{2ex}}

\etocsetstyle{section}{}{}{\makebox[0pt][r]{\etocnumber\hspace{\tocsep}}%
                           \etocname\kern1em\etocpage\par}{}

\etocsettocstyle {\noindent\sffamily{\LARGE \contentsname}\par
                  \thispagestyle{empty}%
                  \noindent\rule{\dimexpr\tocleft-\tocsep}{1pt}\par\vspace{3ex}%
                  \leftskip\tocleft\parindent0pt\def\TEMP{0}}{}

\begin{document}
\frontmatter

\tableofcontents

\chapter{Preface}

\mainmatter

\chapter*{A Few Words About Systems Engineering}
\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{A Few Words About Systems Engineering}

\part{Systems Engineering Practice}

\chapter{Methodology for an integrated Definition of a System and its
  Subsystems: The Case-Study of an Airplane and its Subsystems}

\authorstotoc{Sergio Chiesa, Marco Fioriti and Nicole Viola}

\section{This is a section}

\section{This is another section}

\chapter{Complex-Systems Design Methodology for Systems-Engineering
  Collaborative Environment}

\authorstotoc{Guido Ridolfi, Erwin Mooij and Sabrina Corpino}

\section{Another section}

\section{One more section}

\chapter*{A Few Words About Systems Engineering}
\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{A Few Words About Systems Engineering}

\section*{An unnumbered section}
\addcontentsline{toc}{section}{An unnumbered section}

\end{document}

Earlier code, for the TOC without sections:

\documentclass{book}
\usepackage{etoc}
\etocsetlevel{authors}{1}
\etocsetlevel{section}{2}
\etocsettocdepth{authors}
\newcommand{\authorstotoc}[1]{\etoctoccontentsline{authors}{#1}}

\newlength{\tocleft}
\setlength{\tocleft}{3cm}

\newlength{\tocsep}
\setlength{\tocsep}{2em}


\etocsetstyle{part}{}{}{{\bfseries\makebox[0pt][r]
                              {Part \etocnumber\hspace{\tocsep}}%
                     \etocname\quad\etocpage\par}\vspace{3ex}}{}

% to avoid possible line breaks between chapter (or part) name and page number     
% replace \quad by \kern1em\relax

\etocsetstyle{chapter}{}{}{\etocifnumbered
                             {\makebox[0pt][r]
                               {Chapter \etocnumber\hspace{\tocsep}}}
                             {\ifcase\TEMP
                              \def\TEMP{1}\or\def\TEMP{2}%
                              \makebox[0pt][r]
                                  {\parbox[t]{\dimexpr\tocleft-\tocsep\relax}
                                   {\raggedleft Introductory\\ \strut Chapter}%
                                   \hspace{\tocsep}}\fi
                              }\textbf{\etocname\quad\etocpage}\par
                             \etocifnumbered{}{\vspace{2ex}}}{}

\etocsetstyle{authors}{}{}{\etocname\par\vspace{2ex}}{}

\etocsettocstyle {\noindent\sffamily{\LARGE \contentsname}\par
                  \thispagestyle{empty}%
                  \noindent\rule{\dimexpr\tocleft-\tocsep}{1pt}\par\vspace{3ex}%
                  \leftskip\tocleft\parindent0pt\def\TEMP{0}}{}

\begin{document}
\frontmatter

\tableofcontents

\chapter{Preface}

\mainmatter

\chapter*{A Few Words About Systems Engineering}
\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{A Few Words About Systems Engineering}

\part{Systems Engineering Practice}

\chapter{Methodology for an integrated Definition of a System and its
  Subsystems: The Case-Study of an Airplane and its Subsystems}

\authorstotoc{Sergio Chiesa, Marco Fioriti and Nicole Viola}

\chapter{Complex-Systems Design Methodology for Systems-Engineering
  Collaborative Environment}

\authorstotoc{Guido Ridolfi, Erwin Mooij and Sabrina Corpino}

\end{document}

Related Solutions

Table of Contents – How to Fix Link to Index in TOC Not Pointing Correctly

\addcontentsline doesn't set an achor; it just refers to the latest previous location where an anchor is set and that's why the hyperlink points to the wrong location (a sectional unit, in your case). To get the correct result, use \phantomsection from hyperref to set an anchor at the right location:

\phantomsection
\addcontentsline{toc}{section}{Stichwortverzeichnis}
\printindex

Another option is to use the tocbibind package:

\documentclass[11pt, titlepage]{article}
\usepackage[ngerman]{babel}
\usepackage{blindtext}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}
\usepackage[nottoc]{tocbibind}
\usepackage{makeidx}
\usepackage{hyperref}

\pagestyle{plain}
\makeindex

\title{Stichwortverzeichnis bei \LaTeX\ korrekt verlinken}
\author{Kunigunde Knitterkleid}

%%%%% DOCUMENT %%%%%

\begin{document}
\maketitle

\setcounter{tocdepth}{3}
\tableofcontents
\thispagestyle{empty}
\clearpage

\section{Abschnitt 1}
\subsection{Blabla}
Lorem\index{Lorem|see{Lorem ipsum}} ipsum\index{Lorem ipsum} dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit.
Donec ullamcorper, felis non sodales\index{sodales} commodo, lectus\index{lectus} velit ultrices augue, a dignissim nibh lectus placerat pede.
\clearpage

\section{Abschnitt 2}
\subsection{Hallo}
\paragraph{Und so weiter}
\blindtext
\clearpage

%%%%% INDEX %%%%%

\renewcommand{\indexname}{Stichwortverzeichnis}

\printindex

\end{document}

[Tex/LaTex] Beautiful table of contents with hyperref

This is only a partial answer, but it is kind of a roadmap how this could be achieved.

First, note that the hyperref package does not offer a "standard way" to do such a thing. It only offers border styles for links (including underlining a link as explained here: How can I have colored and underlined links with hyperref?). One of the reasons for this might be that the PDF standard offers such border styles directly for link annotations, but to obtain a non-border style, you need to use appearance streams and form XObjects instead. The documentation of such streams and objects can be found here: http://www.adobe.com/content/dam/Adobe/en/devnet/acrobat/pdfs/pdf_reference_1-7.pdf (start at page 612 for appearance streams and page 355 for form XObjects)

What needs to be done is the following: Find out how the PDF output must look like for a link to have a background color (fortunately, appearance streams already offer three different modes, including one for being inactive and one for hovering over the object; thus, the "action logic" you need is already implemented within the PDF standard and you only need to provide the attributes implementing your desired look).

Then change the corresponding part of the hyperref package by redefining some of its commands as in the "automatic" part of this answer: How can I have colored and underlined links with hyperref?

You can find the source code of the hyperref package here: http://www.ctan.org/pkg/hyperref

Since both the PDF standard and the hyperref package are quite huge, it might involve a significant amount of time just to find the right attributes and commands where to plug these things together, though.

In any case, such a solution might not work with every PDF viewer as most of them do not implement everything that is written in the PDF standard. As long as you only use background color, however, it might work for many viewers (but no guarantees given).

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Table of Contents – How to Fix Link to Index in TOC Not Pointing Correctly

[Tex/LaTex] Beautiful table of contents with hyperref

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