[Tex/LaTex] Not naming an appendix

appendices

Consider the following document:

\documentclass[11pt,a4paper,twoside]{book}
 \usepackage[titletoc,toc,page]{appendix}
 \begin{document}

 \setcounter{tocdepth}{2} 
 \setcounter{secnumdepth}{3} 
 \tableofcontents

 \chapter{First chapter}

 \begin{appendices}
  \chapter[]{Name of appendix}
  \label{ap1}
   blah blah
 \end{appendices}

\end{document}

This produces in the TOC:

Contents

1 First chapter......3
Appendices...........5
Appendix A...........7

and in the body of the document:

Chapter 1
First chapter

Appendices

Appendix A
Name of appendix
blah blah

I don't want to give a name to the appendix, I find it irrelevant. But I'm forced to do it with the \chapter[]{Name of appendix} command.

Is there a way not to have to give each appendix a name? This is the result I want in the body of the document (the TOC stays the same):

Chapter 1
First chapter

Appendices

Appendix A
blah blah

Now, I know I can just leave the \chapter[]{} command empty and so the title won't show, but I'm looking for a more integral solution and not just an ugly hack.

PD: this question originated here.

EDIT

I'm sorry but I'd forgotten my document is in spanish so I didn't add the specific packages. This is what the document looks like now with Werner's new definitions added:

\documentclass[11pt,a4paper,twoside]{book}

\makeatletter
\newcommand{\nonameappendix}{%
\def\@makechapterhead##1{%
  \vspace*{50\p@}%
  {\parindent \z@ \raggedright \normalfont
    \ifnum \c@secnumdepth >\m@ne
      \if@mainmatter
        \huge\bfseries \@chapapp\space \thechapter
        \par\nobreak
        %\vskip 20\p@ % <--- Removed
      \fi
    \fi
    %\interlinepenalty\@M % <--- Removed
    %\Huge \bfseries ##1\par\nobreak % <--- Removed
    \vskip 40\p@
  }}%
\def\chaptermark##1{%
      \markboth {\MakeUppercase{%
        \ifnum \c@secnumdepth >\m@ne
          \if@mainmatter
            \@chapapp\ \thechapter%
          \fi
        \fi
        }}{}}}
\makeatother
\newcommand{\newappendix}{\chapter[]{}}%
\usepackage[titletoc,toc,page]{appendix}

\usepackage[latin1]{inputenc}
\usepackage[spanish,activeacute]{babel}

\begin{document}

\setcounter{tocdepth}{2} 
\setcounter{secnumdepth}{3} 
\tableofcontents

\chapter{First chapter}

\renewcommand{\appendixtocname}{Ap\'endices}
\renewcommand{\appendixpagename}{Ap\'endices}
\begin{appendices}

  \nonameappendix
  \newappendix
  \label{ap1}
  \include{apendiceA}

\end{appendices}

\end{document}

where the apendiceA.tex file has nothing but text (ie: no chapter commands, no labels, etc..)

The issues I'm having with this is:

1-I get Apéndice A. in the TOC (notice the dot at the end). This is really minor but it still bugs me.

2- In the body of the document, after the Apéndice A title is displayed the text only begins in the next page. This is more serious.

Best Answer

Here's an option that provides \nonameappendix and \newappendix. The first command sets up the chapter heading macros (removing the inclusion of a name in the chapter title), effectively treating it like a \chapter*. The second command does \chapter[]{} for convenience.

enter image description here

\documentclass[11pt,a4paper,twoside]{book}
\usepackage{lipsum}% http://ctan.org/pkg/lipsum
\makeatletter
\newcommand{\nonameappendix}{%
\def\@makechapterhead##1{%
  \vspace*{50\p@}%
  {\parindent \z@ \raggedright \normalfont
    \ifnum \c@secnumdepth >\m@ne
      \if@mainmatter
        \huge\bfseries \@chapapp\space \thechapter
        \par\nobreak
        %\vskip 20\p@ % <--- Removed
      \fi
    \fi
    %\interlinepenalty\@M % <--- Removed
    %\Huge \bfseries ##1\par\nobreak % <--- Removed
    \vskip 40\p@
  }}%
\def\chaptermark##1{%
      \markboth {\MakeUppercase{%
        \ifnum \c@secnumdepth >\m@ne
          \if@mainmatter
            \@chapapp\ \thechapter%
          \fi
        \fi
        }}{}}}
\makeatother
\newcommand{\newappendix}{\chapter[]{}}%
\usepackage[titletoc,toc,page]{appendix}% http://ctan.org/pkg/appendix
\begin{document}

\setcounter{tocdepth}{2} 
\setcounter{secnumdepth}{3} 
\tableofcontents

\chapter{First chapter}

\begin{appendices}
  \nonameappendix
  \newappendix
  \label{ap1}
  \lipsum[1]

  \newappendix
  \lipsum[2]
\end{appendices}

\end{document}​

There's also the requirement modification to \chaptermark which typically sets APPENDIX <num>.\ TITLE in the header. It now just sets APPENDIX <num>. This is also modified by \nonameappendix, with definitions taken from book.cls.

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