[texhax] trying to modify book.cls to automatically add TOC entry for \chapter* gives errors

[Barbara Beeton]

On Wed, 7 May 2008, Niall Mansfield wrote:

    - Using book.cls
    - Want to change \chapter*{} in order to:
    	* add a TOC entry
    	* set the running heads
       so that we can use \chapter*{} for Preface, Foreword,
       Glossary, etc.

    The definition we took from book.cls is, after simplifying:

    \def\@schapter#1{
         \@makeschapterhead{#1}%
         \@afterheading}

    If we change that to do either of the things we want, e.g.:

    \def\@schapter#1{
         \@makeschapterhead{#1}%
         \@afterheading
         \addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{#1}}

    we get error:

       ! TeX capacity exceeded, sorry [input stack size=300].
       \originalTeX ->\noextrasenglish
    				  \let \originalTeX \@empty \lefthyphenmin =2\...
       l.1 \select at language {english}

    or, if we clear out the existing .toc file first, we get:

       No file authdns.toc.
       [1
       ! Undefined control sequence.
       \\->\let \reserved at e
    		       \relax \let \reserved at f \relax \@ifstar {\let \reserved...
       l.60 \listoftables

    However, if we change the added line to:

       \addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{foobar}

    then it "works", i.e. runs without error, but it's useless
    of course.  The same pattern happens when we try to insert
    	\mkboth{#1}{#1}
    into \@schapter.

i'm not really conversant with how book.cls
does its toc insertions, but the amsbook.cls
does put the starred chapters into the t-of-c.
you might be able to crib some code from that.

    I assume I'm doing something stupid, but I'm so confused
    after trying this for hours that I can't think how to
    start tracking it down.  Help!

i've also seen your other message about adding
"Appendices" in the t-of-c.  i think your best
bet there is to use something like this:

  \addcontentsline{toc}{part}{Appendices}

alternatively, you could try entering all the
gory details:

  \addtocontents{toc}{\protect\contentsline{part}%
    {\protect\tocpart{}{}{Appendices}}{}

with amsbook, this would give just the heading,
with no page number; i'm not sure how book.cls
will react to this.

good luck.
							-- bb