Customizing my TOC

Question

I am trying to edit the cls file from my university, specifically to change the toc macros. What I have (the macros):

\renewcommand*\l@chapter[2]{%
\ifnum \c@tocdepth >\m@ne
\setcounter{secnumdepth}{3}%
\setcounter{tocdepth}{2} %   
\addpenalty{-\@highpenalty}%
\vskip .1cm \@plus \p@ %{the v-distance between the headings in the contents}
\setlength\@tempdima{0.5cm}% %{the distance between the number of the chapter and its title}
\begingroup
\parindent\z@ \rightskip \@pnumwidth
\parfillskip -\@pnumwidth
\leavevmode
\advance \leftskip \@tempdima 
\hskip  -\leftskip 
\etchapterheadstyle{#1}\nobreak
% CCW: The following 3 lines add dots to the chapter TOC listings
\leaders\hbox{$\m@th
    \mkern \@dotsep mu\hbox{.}\mkern \@dotsep
    mu$}\hfill
\hfil \nobreak\hb@xt@\@pnumwidth{\hss #2}\par
\penalty\@highpenalty
\endgroup
\fi}

Which produces something like this TOC in my thesis:

for example the abstract is added in the main tex file as such:

\pagenumbering{roman}{
  \newgeometry{left=33mm,right=25mm,top=25mm,bottom=25mm} 
  \addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{\textbf{ABSTRACT}}
  \include{AbstractV2_B5}
}

What I need is a TOC in my thesis like this:

Using other packages like tocleft messes with the existing TOC so much, I'd rather just deal with existing available commands without additional packages.

Currently I managed to achiev this but there is still a bit of patch work to do:

and the appendix:

My question is:

1. Can someone help me to achieve the desired TOC? Either with macro editing in the cls file, or a \renewcommand to achieve the TOC in my main tex.

a) The page number needs to be center aligned.

b) The word "CHAPTER" needs to be slightly pushed to the right, and raised by a singlespace.

c) Whenever I indent the "INTRODUCTION" and the rest of the chapter through this command:

\makeatletter
%\renewcommand{\@tocrmarg}{4em}                     
\renewcommand{\@pnumwidth}{3em}
\renewcommand{\l@chapter}{\@dottedtocline{1}{2.35em}{5.5em}}
\renewcommand{\l@section}{\@dottedtocline{2}{7.8em}{2.6em}}
\renewcommand{\l@subsection}{\@dottedtocline{3}{10.4em}{3.6em}}
\renewcommand{\l@subsubsection}{\@dottedtocline{4}{7.4em}{4.5em}}
\makeatother

I also indented the "ABSTRACT" which is not desired like this like in the figure above

d) Im using the following in the main tex to add my appendices:

\renewcommand\appendixname{APPENDICES}
\addtocontents{toc}{\protect\vskip-2\baselineskip}
\addtocontents{toc}{\addvspace{-2\baselineskip}}  
\appendix
\include{AppendixA_A4} % Appendix A: Title of the appendix %
\include{AppendixB_A4} % Appendix B: Title of the appendix %

but it ended up with some alignment issue as seen in the figure above. How do I incorporate \appendix to the desired TOC so that it matches ?

2. Can someone please break the macros down for me, I know it is a lot, I appreciate it though, a rough breakdown would do.

I try my best to come out with the MWE. Im not sure what to do with the include files, so i created a dummy everything and put it in a zip file:

the dummy \include files and cls file and MWE.tex

Answer 1

It was, as always is, a little bit difficult to find and understand what another person changed in the cls file.

Personally, I find unacceptable ask students to use a given class file, but also ask them to change something. When I provide a cls file, it is my obligation to provide a class file that students don't need to edit in order to achieve a request I also ask them to do.

To make things simple, I will present your contents separatedly.

thesis.tex

This is your main file, you should add your contents here, preferably using \include and/or \input. I replaced your packages into another file, since I didn't need to edit them. The file input_titletoc will be discussed in the last section, it contains the commands to format your table of contents as you want.

\documentclass[b5paper,twoside,openany,tocchapterhead,10pt]{TheClass}
\input{input_packages}
\input{input_titletoc}
\begin{document}
\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{\textbf{ABSTRACT}}
\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{\textbf{ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS}}
\tableofcontents
\listoftables
\listoffigures
\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{\textbf{LIST OF ALGORITHMS}}
\mainmatter
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
\chapter{my first chapter}
\section{my first section}
\section{my second section}
\subsection{my first subsection}
\subsection{my second subsection}
\subsubsection{my first subsubsection}
\subsubsection{my second subsubsection}
\section{my third section}
\begin{table}
  \caption{mytable}
\end{table}
\begin{table}
  \caption{mytable}
\end{table}
\begin{table}
  \caption{mytable}
\end{table}
\chapter{my second chapter}
\section{my first section}
\section{my second section}
\subsection{my first subsection}
\subsection{my second subsection}
\subsubsection{my first subsubsection}
\subsubsection{my second subsubsection}
\section{my third section}
\begin{figure}
  \caption{myfigure}
\end{figure}
\begin{figure}
  \caption{myfigure}
\end{figure}
\begin{figure}
  \caption{myfigure}
\end{figure}
\renewcommand\appendixname{APPENDICES}
\appendix
\chapter{my appendice}
\section{my first section}
\section{my second section}
\subsection{my first subsection}
\subsection{my second subsection}
\subsubsection{my first subsubsection}
\subsubsection{my second subsubsection}
\section{my third section}
\chapter{my appendice}
\section{my first section}
\section{my second section}
\subsection{my first subsection}
\subsection{my second subsection}
\subsubsection{my first subsubsection}
\subsubsection{my second subsubsection}
\section{my third section}
\end{document}

TheClass.cls

As this file a 200+ lines long and you provided it through a link, I will inform only where you need to update.

At line 160, change update the command iftocflag with the following lines:

\iftocflag
  \let\old@chapter = \@chapter
  \def\@chapter[#1]#2{
    \ifnum\c@chapter=0%
      \addtocontents{toc}{\protect\contentsline{part}%
        {\hspace{15pt}\normalsize\etchapterheadstyle{\@chapapp}}{}\\
      }
    \fi%
    \old@chapter[#1]{#2}
  }
\fi

Instruction ifnum\c@chapter=0 is responsable for writing CHAPTER above the chapters numbers and only before chapters, \hspace{15pt} corrects its displacement horizontally.

Personal note: At lines 227--235, there are a few \newtheorems. I would not define them inside a class file, but in a style file. But this kind of implemetation is more a preference than a rule.

input_packages.tex

I just separated your packages into a file. They don't interfere with your main question.

I think the package geometry is useless. Your class is constructed over the report class and load b5paper. I compiled your file without geometry and it didn't change a thing, but I can say for sure because there might be something hidden which I didn't identify.

\usepackage{titlesec}
\usepackage[english]{babel}
\usepackage{geometry}
\usepackage{tikz}
\usepackage[font=bf]{caption}
\usepackage{array}
\usepackage{booktabs} 
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
\newcolumntype{L}[1]{>{\raggedright\let\newline\\\arraybackslash\hspace{0.25pt}}m{#1}}
\newcolumntype{C}[1]{>{\centering\let\newline\\\arraybackslash\hspace{0.0cm}}m{#1}}
\newcolumntype{R}[1]{>{\raggedleft\let\newline\\\arraybackslash\hspace{0pt}}m{#1}}
\titleformat{\section}
{\normalfont\fontsize{10}{15}\rmfamily\bfseries}
{\thesection}
{1em}
{}
\titleformat{\subsection}
{\normalfont\fontsize{10}{15} \rmfamily\bfseries}
{\thesubsection}
{1em}
{}
\titleformat{\subsubsection}
{\normalfont\fontsize{10}{15}\rmfamily\bfseries}
{\thesubsubsection}
{1em}
{}
\addto\captionsenglish{
  \renewcommand{\contentsname}{\bfseries Table of Contents}%
}
\setlength{\parskip}{1\baselineskip}

input_titletoc.tex

The main file to edit the apperance of your table of contents. My answer uses code from How can I edit the table of contents? based on CTAN titletoc and from List of Figures/Tables - eliminate dots? -- actually your have already used it to remove dots in list of tables and figures.

Each \titlecontents{...} formats an object. I edited numbers in order to align the contents as in our example. Line {\contentslabel[\thecontentslabel]{3.0em}\textsc} is responsable for changing the appearence of your chapters' name.

Suggestion: This file with the instructions with titletoc could be inside the class file (.cls) or in a style file (.sty). To learn more about it, please check Style/class tutorials and Writing your own package.

\usepackage{titletoc}
% Remove dots in list of tables and figures
\makeatletter \renewcommand{@dotsep}{10000} \makeatother
\titlecontents{chapter}
[7.0em] %5.3
{\bigskip}
{\contentslabel[\thecontentslabel]{3.0em}\textsc}
{\hspace{-5.5em}\textbf}% unnumbered chapters
{\titlerule[1pc]{ }\contentspage}[\smallskip]%
\titlecontents{section}
[7.0em] % i
{\smallskip}
{\thecontentslabel\enspace}%\thecontentslabel
{\hspace{-5.5em}}
{\titlerule[1pc]{ }\contentspage}%]
\titlecontents{subsection}
[9.0em] %
{\smallskip}
{\thecontentslabel\enspace}%\thecontentslabel
{\hspace{7.12em}}
{\titlerule[1pc]{ }\contentspage}

Results

Finally, your table of contents looks like you wanted, including appendices.