Assembling multiple beamer slide decks into “book” with “chapters” and TOC

Question

I have a number of related beamer slide decks that I'd like to print as a bound handout "book".

My file layout is as follows:

A general include file (include.tex) used by most other files:

\documentclass[12pt,table,english,t,compress]{beamer}
\author{...}
% \usepackage defintions

\title{...}

\usetheme{Warsaw}
\usecolortheme{seahorse}

% Various color and command definitions

Then, for each of my slide decks, I have a pair of files (deck_1.tex, deck_1_slides.tex) structured as follows:

% deck_1.tex

\input{include.tex}

\begin{document}

\input{deck_1_slides.tex}

\end{document}

And:

% deck_1_slides.tex

\subtitle{Deck 1 subtitle}

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

\begin{frame}
    \frametitle{Outline}

    %\tableofcontents[pausesections]
    \tableofcontents
\end{frame}


\section{Section A}

\begin{frame} \frametitle{XXX} ... \end{frame}
\begin{frame} \frametitle{YYY} ... \end{frame}
\begin{frame} \frametitle{ZZZ} ... \end{frame}

\section{Section B}

\begin{frame} \frametitle{AAA} ... \end{frame}
\begin{frame} \frametitle{BBB} ... \end{frame}
\begin{frame} \frametitle{CCC} ... \end{frame}

...

The above set up works fine for producing the individual slide decks. I get the conventional numbering "Page-N/Total-pages" on each slide, and I have Section TOCs that appear at the start of each section. All well and good.

However, I am stuck when it comes to producing the "book" version of the slides. What I would like to do is this:

1. Treat each slide deck as a numbered chapter. When producing the handout version, make the running number at the bottom of each slide "Chapter-number / slide-number" (i.e., drop the "Total slides").

2. Change the Section TOC's in each slide deck to be just the "Section Title" or, perhaps the "Chapter Title" (i.e., the \subtitle in the decks above) plus the "Section Title".

3. Produce a "Grand TOC" at the start of the "book", which consists of just the "Chapter" titles and "Section" titles. I'd like the Grand TOC to include the "Chapter-number / slide-number" page numbering used in the individual decks.

4. Update: I realize that there is another point that I had in mind that I did not make explicit in my original formulation. In the grand TOC I'd like to see numbering of the form Chapter.Section.

For example, the Chapter.Section numbering in the Grant TOC might look like this:

1    Deck 1 title                   1-nn
1.1  Deck 1 Section 1 title         1-nn
1.2  Deck 1 Section 2 title         1-nn
1.3  Deck 1 Section 3 title         1-nn
2    Deck 2 title                   2-nn
2.1  Deck 2 Section 1 title         2-nn
2.2  Deck 2 Section 2 title         2-nn

("nn" are frame numbers)

Analogously, in the Deck TOCs I'd like to have something like this (here, for Deck 2)

2    Deck 2 title                   2-nn
2.1  Deck 2 Section 1 title         2-nn
2.2  Deck 2 Section 2 title         2-nn

I'm assuming all of the above is possible, since LaTeX is fairly flexible (I'm a relative newbie), but I'm a little lost trying to achieve the book version with the features described above (especially 1 and 3). Any tips would be greatly appreciated.

Answer 1

As proposed by the question-opener in the comments to my first answer, here a different approach: Change section to subsection and include the different decks a sections.

• No changes in deck_n.tex.
• Replace \section by \subsection in deck_n_slides.tex.
• To specify the appearance of the "Deck TOC" use the options for for \tableofcontents. (e.g. use \tableofcontents[sectionstyle=hide,subsection=show] in deck_n_slides.tex).

Replace include.tex with

\documentclass[12pt,table,english,t,compress]{beamer}
\author{Author}
\institute{Institute}

\title{Title}

\usetheme{Warsaw}
\useoutertheme{infolines}
\usecolortheme{seahorse}

\makeatletter
    \let\origSubsection\subsection
    \def\subsection#1{\stepcounter{framenumber} \origSubsection[#1]{#1 \hfill \ \arabic{section} -- \arabic{framenumber}} \addtocounter{framenumber}{-1}}
    \let\origSection\section
    \def\section#1{\setcounter{framenumber}{1} \origSection[#1]{#1 \hfill \ \arabic{section} -- \arabic{framenumber}} \addtocounter{framenumber}{-1}}
\makeatother

\newcommand{\sectionnumber}[1]{\setcounter{section}{#1} \addtocounter{section}{-1}}

\setbeamertemplate{section in toc}{\inserttocsectionnumber~\inserttocsection}
\setbeamertemplate{subsection in toc}{\inserttocsectionnumber.\inserttocsubsectionnumber~\inserttocsubsection\\}

\makeatletter
\setbeamertemplate{footline}
{
    \leavevmode%
    \hbox
    {%
        \begin{beamercolorbox}[wd=.333333\paperwidth,ht=2.25ex,dp=1ex,center]{author in head/foot}%
            \usebeamerfont{author in head/foot}\insertshortauthor~~\beamer@ifempty{\insertshortinstitute}{}{(\insertshortinstitute)}
        \end{beamercolorbox}%
        \begin{beamercolorbox}[wd=.333333\paperwidth,ht=2.25ex,dp=1ex,center]{title in head/foot}%
            \usebeamerfont{title in head/foot}\insertshorttitle
        \end{beamercolorbox}%
        \begin{beamercolorbox}[wd=.333333\paperwidth,ht=2.25ex,dp=1ex,right]{date in head/foot}%
            \usebeamerfont{date in head/foot}\insertshortdate{}\hspace*{2em}
            \insertsectionnumber{} -- \insertframenumber\hspace*{2ex} 
        \end{beamercolorbox}
    }%
    \vskip0pt%
}
\makeatother

For the collection of all slides you can use then handout.tex given as follows

% handout.tex

\input{include.tex}
\date{yyyy-mm-dd}

\begin{document}

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

\begin{frame}
    \frametitle{Grand TOC}
    \tableofcontents
\end{frame}

\input{deck_1_slides.tex}
\input{deck_2_slides.tex}

\end{document}

Answer 2

I leave my original answer. Some possible changes according to the edit in the question are listed below. A little piece to cover all the details of the question is still missing and explained in the last section.

---

Original answer

I tried to find a solution within the following design principles:

1. No changes in the files include.tex, deck_1.tex, deck_1_slides.tex, such that the individual slide sets remain unchanged.
2. Usage of high-level commands, when possible.
3. Usage of as few additional packages as possible. In my solution only nameref is needed.

This led to the following solution (the full code and the image of the "Grand TOC" are posted below):

• The changes are all made in a main file named handout.tex, there the slide files (e.g. deck_1_slide.tex) are loaded with included with input

• I use the part option of \tableofcontents in the beamer class. Therefore I redifined \subtitle

  \let\origSubtitle\subtitle
  \renewcommand{\subtitle}[1]{%
      \origSubtitle{#1}%
      \stepcounter{chapter} \part{\thechapter}%
      \labelname{#1} \label{chapter:\thechapter}}
  

• To change the numbering style I adjusted the beamertemplate footline. (In the example code below I adapted it to the outer theme infolines.)

• Since this numbering style can not be used at the beginning for the "Grand TOC" `footline``is changed locally once more.

• To get the desired numbering in the table of contents I used the short sectiontitle ability. Hence the redefinition of \section

  \makeatletter
  \let\origSection\section
  \def\section#1{\stepcounter{framenumber} \origSection[#1]{#1 \dotfill \ \insertpartnumber{} / \arabic{framenumber}} \addtocounter{framenumber}{-1}}
  \makeatother
  

• Finally I define a new command \grandtoc which take the "part"-number as input, to set the "Grand TOC".

Full code (deck_2.tex and deck_2_slides.tex have the same form as there counterparts deck_1.tex and deck_1_slides.tex):

% handout.tex

\input{include.tex}

% Outher theme to have running numbers at the bottom
\useoutertheme{infolines}
\institute{Institute}
\date{yyyy-mm-dd}

\usepackage{nameref} % new package

\makeatletter
\newcommand{\labelname}[1]{\def\@currentlabelname{#1}}
\makeatother

\newcounter{chapter}

% redefinition fo subtitle
\let\origSubtitle\subtitle
\renewcommand{\subtitle}[1]{%
    \origSubtitle{#1}%
    \stepcounter{chapter} \part{\thechapter}%
    \labelname{#1} \label{chapter:\thechapter}}

\makeatletter
\setbeamertemplate{footline}
{
    \leavevmode%
    \hbox{%
        \begin{beamercolorbox}[wd=.333333\paperwidth,ht=2.25ex,dp=1ex,center]{author in head/foot}%
            \usebeamerfont{author in head/foot}\insertshortauthor~~\beamer@ifempty{\insertshortinstitute}{}{(\insertshortinstitute)}
        \end{beamercolorbox}%
        \begin{beamercolorbox}[wd=.333333\paperwidth,ht=2.25ex,dp=1ex,center]{title in head/foot}%
            \usebeamerfont{title in head/foot}\insertshorttitle
        \end{beamercolorbox}%
        \begin{beamercolorbox}[wd=.333333\paperwidth,ht=2.25ex,dp=1ex,right]{date in head/foot}%
            \usebeamerfont{date in head/foot}\insertshortdate{}\hspace*{2em}
            \insertpartnumber{} / \insertframenumber\hspace*{2ex} 
        \end{beamercolorbox}}%
    \vskip0pt%
}
\makeatother

\AtBeginPart{\setcounter{framenumber}{0}}

% redinition of section
\makeatletter
\let\origSection\section
\def\section#1{\stepcounter{framenumber} \origSection[#1]{#1 \dotfill \ \insertpartnumber{} / \arabic{framenumber}} \addtocounter{framenumber}{-1}}
\makeatother

\newcommand{\grandtoc}[1]
{%
    {\usebeamercolor[fg]{structure} \nameref{chapter:#1}}%
    \tableofcontents[part=#1,sectionsstyle=show,subsectionstyle=hide]%
}

\begin{document}

{
    \makeatletter
    \setbeamertemplate{footline}
    {
        \leavevmode%
        \hbox{%
            \begin{beamercolorbox}[wd=.333333\paperwidth,ht=2.25ex,dp=1ex,center]{author in head/foot}%
                \usebeamerfont{author in head/foot}\insertshortauthor~~\beamer@ifempty{\insertshortinstitute}{}{(\insertshortinstitute)}
            \end{beamercolorbox}%
            \begin{beamercolorbox}[wd=.333333\paperwidth,ht=2.25ex,dp=1ex,center]{title in head/foot}%
                \usebeamerfont{title in head/foot}\insertshorttitle
            \end{beamercolorbox}%
            \begin{beamercolorbox}[wd=.333333\paperwidth,ht=2.25ex,dp=1ex,right]{date in head/foot}%
                \usebeamerfont{date in head/foot}\insertshortdate{}\hspace*{2em}
            \end{beamercolorbox}}%
        \vskip0pt%  
    }
    \makeatother

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

    \begin{frame}
        \frametitle{Grand TOC}
        \grandtoc{1}
        \grandtoc{2}
    \end{frame}
}

\input{deck_1_slides.tex}
\input{deck_2_slides.tex}

\end{document}

This results in the following "Grand TOC":

Changes (to be made to answer the edited question)

To do not reset the framenumber for a new part delete the line \AtBeginPart{\setcounter{framenumber}{0}}.

To reset the section number for each part include (following this)

\makeatletter
\AtBeginPart{%
    \beamer@tocsectionnumber=0\relax
    \setcounter{section}{0}
}
\makeatother

Attention: You can only have one active \AtBeginPart. To reset the framenumber and the section number, merge them together.

To have (almost) the desired numbering style of the "Grand TOC" replace the redefinition of \section and the definition of \grandtoc with

% redinition of section
\makeatletter
\let\origSection\section
\def\section#1{\stepcounter{framenumber} \origSection[#1]{#1 \hfill \ \insertpartnumber{} -- \arabic{framenumber}} \addtocounter{framenumber}{-1}}
\makeatother

\newcommand{\grandtoc}[1]
{%
    {\usebeamercolor[fg]{structure} #1 \nameref{chapter:#1}}%
    \setbeamertemplate{section in toc}{#1.\inserttocsectionnumber~\inserttocsection}
    \tableofcontents[part=#1,sectionsstyle=show,subsectionstyle=hide]%
} 

To have the "Deck TOC" formatted accordingly do the following (in contrast to my design principles - but I have no other idea):

• Add \newcommand{\grandtoc}[1]{\tableofcontents} and \renewcommand{\thepart}{0} to the preamble of every deck_n.tex.
• Replace in every deck_n_slides.tex \tableofcontents with \grandtoc{\thepart}

With this two command the style of compiling a single deck will not be altered, but for the book, the "Deck TOC" is redefined.

With these changes the "Grand TOC" now looks as follows.

What is still missing

For the TOC there is no framenumber shown for the start of the different parts. The main reason therefore is, that with my solution the part title is not stored in the .toc-file but typeset directly. To include really the parts into the .toc, one might use ideas from here. However, I assume,that this would lead to major necessary changes in other parts of the solution presented. Additionally, the difficulty described above is the reason, why title of parts are not aligned properly.