Problems with chapter headings going from dvi to pdf.

Question

I want to redefine the chapter headings using some code that I took from a friend. It works fine when I create a dvi and I see it in Okular (it doesn't look fine using Evince), but when I try generate a pdf either with pdflatex or dvipdf, the headings look wrong. I've no idea what the problem can be.

Here is an example. Thanks in advance.

\documentclass{report}

\usepackage{psboxit}
\usepackage{pstricks}

% Title for chapters
\makeatletter
\def\thickhrulefill{\leavevmode \leaders \hrule height 1ex \hfill \kern \z@}
\def\@makechapterhead#1{%
  \reset@font
  \parindent \z@
  \vspace*{10\p@}%
  \hbox{%
    \vbox{%
      \hsize=2cm%
      \begin{tabular}{c}
        \scshape \strut \@chapapp{} \\
        \psboxit{box 0 0 0 setrgbcolor fill}{%
          \vrule depth 8em width 0pt%
          \vrule height 0pt depth 0pt width 10pt%
          {\white \LARGE \bfseries
            \strut \vrule height 1em depth 0pt width 0pt
            \thechapter}%
          \vrule height 0pt depth 0pt width 10pt%
          }
      \end{tabular}%
      }%
    \vbox{%
      \advance\hsize by -2cm
      \hrule height 0.4pt depth 0pt width \hsize
      \par
      \vskip 6pt%
      \hspace{20pt}%
      \parbox{260pt}{%
        \LARGE \bfseries #1
     }%
      }%
    }%
  \vskip 100\p@
}

\begin{document}
\chapter{Introduction}
Intro here.
\end{document}

Answer 1

Here's a possible solution using titlesec and TikZ; the new style for the chapter titles is defined through a command:

\documentclass[twoside]{report}
\usepackage[rigidchapters,explicit]{titlesec}
\usepackage{tikz}
\usepackage{lipsum}

\newcommand\MyChapFormat{%
\titleformat{\chapter}[block]
  { }{}{0pt}
  {\begin{tikzpicture}[%
      blackrec/.style={draw,fill=black,minimum height=3cm,minimum width=0.8cm},%
      remember picture,overlay]
   \node[blackrec] (BS) at (0.5,0) {};
   \node[anchor=north,yshift=-0.3cm] at (BS.north)%
     {\textcolor{white}{\Large\bfseries\thechapter}};
   \node[anchor=south] at (BS.north) {\scshape\chaptername};
   \draw[ultra thick] (1.6,1) -- (\textwidth,1);
   \node[anchor=north,align=left,text width=0.83\textwidth,xshift=6cm,yshift=-0.1cm] at (1,1)    
     {\bfseries\Large##1};
  }
  [\end{tikzpicture}]
\titlespacing{\chapter}{0pt}{0pt}{150pt}
}
\begin{document}
\tableofcontents

\MyChapFormat
\chapter{Introduction }

\lipsum[1]

\end{document}

Here's the result (I only include an image for the chapter corresponding to "Introduction"):

Answer 2

Use the memoir class and check the »MemoirChapterStyles« document for the BlueBox (VZ39) chapter style.

Answer 3

You could also try using dvips and then converting to PDF; that would give the PSTricks code a chance to run...