Links from table back to ref using the name (not number) of the table

Question

I'm trying to create a two-way link between tables/figures and the list of all tables/figures that I manually created. I.e., each item in the list of tables should link to a table, and clicking on the table caption should link back to the reference.

When linking the table/figure, I would like to use the table/figure name, not its number, as is possible with \namref.

I found a solution that works when using \ref, but when I try to insert \nameref inside of the hyperlink, it doesn't work anymore. I tried inserting \phantomsection before the table label and removing the link using \nameref* to avoid clashes between the links, but that didn't help. I also tried various other link setups, such as with cleverref, but didn't succeed yet.

So the following code doesn't work, but if I replaced \nameref with \ref, it would work. But I want the table name in the reference (without manually typing it out because I have hundreds of tables), and not the table number.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{hyperref}
\newcommand{\mylabel}[2]{%
  \hyperlink{back:#1}{\hypertarget{#1}{#2}}
}
\newcommand{\myref}[2]{%
  \hyperlink{#1}{\hypertarget{back:#1}{#2}}
}
\begin{document}
\begin{enumerate}
    \item \myref{link}{\nameref{testtab}}
\end{enumerate}
\newpage
\begin{table}
\caption{\mylabel{link}{My Table}}\label{testtab}
\centering
\begin{tabular}[t]{rr}
\toprule
\textbf{Col A} & \textbf{Col B} \
\midrule
1 & A \
2 & B \
\end{tabular}
\end{table}
\end{document}

Weirdly, with \nameref, the output shows two links, with one on top that seems to link to itself, and the other being only clickable at the very right and linking correctly to the table (see screenshot).

How could I set this up correctly?

Thank you so much in advance for any tips, I'm new to StackExchange and relatively new to LaTeX, so any support is highly appreciated.

Edit: The list(s) of tables/figures I want to create needs to be highly customizable (contain both linked and non-linked entries, multiple depths, be split into multiple parts, contain tables and figures), such that \listoftables doesn't seem to be an alternative way to solve the issue

Answer 1

I would recommend to use \listoftables and \listoffigures. In this case, you can patch \contentsline to add an additional hyper target and patch \caption to use this additional hyper target:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{caption}% To support \caption above tabular.
\usepackage{booktabs}
\usepackage{lipsum}% Dummy text for the example.
\usepackage{hyperref}
\makeatletter
\AtBeginDocument{%
% 1. Patch \contentsline to automatically add a hyper target to the LoT entry
%    and the LoF entry.
  \addtocontents{lot}{%
    \string\let\string\normalcontentsline\string\contentsline
    \string\let\string\contentsline\string\backrefcontentsline
  }%
  \addtocontents{lof}{%
    \string\let\string\normalcontentsline\string\contentsline
    \string\let\string\contentsline\string\backrefcontentsline
  }%
  \newcommand{\backrefcontentsline}[4]{%
    \hypertarget{back.#4}{\normalcontentsline{#1}{#2}{#3}{#4}}%
  }%
% 2. Patch \caption to automatically link to the hyper target of the LoT/LoF entry.
  \NewCommandCopy\Caption\caption
  \RenewDocumentCommand\caption{O{#2}m}{%
    \Caption[{#1}]{\hyperlink{back.@currentHref}{#2}}
  }%
}
\makeatother
\begin{document}
\listoftables
\listoffigures
\newpage
\begin{table}
  \show\caption
\caption{My Table}\label{testtab}
\centering
\begin{tabular}{rr}
\toprule
\textbf{Col A} & \textbf{Col B} \
\midrule
1 & A \
2 & B \
\end{tabular}
\end{table}
\begin{figure}
  \centering
  \rule{1cm}{1cm}
  \caption{My figure}
\end{figure}
\lipsum
\begin{table}
  \centering
  \caption{One more Table}
  \begin{tabular}{lr}
    left & right
  \end{tabular}
\end{table}
\end{document}

Note: This patch work, with or without package caption.

But to really not have links from the caption into the \listoffigures and \listoftables but one dedicated reference, I would define new commands:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{hyperref}
\NewDocumentCommand\captionbacktonameref{O{#2}mm}{%
  \caption[{#1}]{\hyperlink{nameback:#3}{#2}}\label{#3}%
}
\newcommand*\namerefwithbackref[1]{%
  \hypertarget{nameback:#1}{\nameref{#1}}%
}
\begin{document}
See \namerefwithbackref{tab:test} (the link
anchor from the table would is here).
See also (without back-ref) \nameref{fig:test}.
\newpage
\begin{table}
  \centering
  \begin{tabular}{lr}
    left & right
  \end{tabular}
  \captionbacktonameref{Test Table}{tab:test}
\end{table}
\begin{figure}
  \centering
  \rule{1cm}{1cm}
  \captionbacktonameref{Test Figure}{fig:test}
\end{figure}
\clearpage
See \namerefwithbackref{fig:test} (the link
anchor from the figure is here).
See also \nameref{tab:test}.
\end{document}

So now it is your decision to use either \caption without link back to any reference or \captiontobackref (with link back to exactly one \namerefwithbackref. You can also decide where to have the anchor for the link from within the caption using either \namerefwithbackref or still using \nameref.

This can also be extended to support back also links from/to the number instead of the name:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{hyperref}
\NewDocumentCommand\captionbacktonameref{O{#2}mm}{%
  \caption[{#1}]{\hyperlink{nameback:#3}{#2}}\label{#3}%
}
\makeatletter
\NewDocumentCommand\captionbacktorefs{O{#2}mm}{%
  \expandafter\let\expandafter\orig@fnum\csname fnum@@captype\endcsname
  @namedef{fnum@@captype}{%
    \hyperlink{numback:#3}{\orig@fnum}%
  }%
  \caption[{#1}]{\hyperlink{nameback:#3}{#2}}\label{#3}%
}
\makeatother
\newcommand\namerefwithbackref[1]{%
  \hypertarget{nameback:#1}{\nameref{#1}}%
}
\newcommand\refwithbackref[1]{%
  \hypertarget{numback:#1}{\ref{#1}}%
}
\begin{document}
See \namerefwithbackref{tab:test} (the link
anchor from the table would is here).
See also Figure \refwithbackref{fig:test} (the link anchor from the figure number is
here) \nameref{fig:test} (the name isn't an anchor).
\newpage
\begin{table}
  \centering
  \begin{tabular}{lr}
    left & right
  \end{tabular}
  \captionbacktonameref{Test Table}{tab:test}
\end{table}
\begin{figure}
  \centering
  \rule{1cm}{1cm}
  \captionbacktorefs{Test Figure}{fig:test}
\end{figure}
\clearpage
See Figure \ref{fig:test} (the number isn't an anchor)
  \namerefwithbackref{fig:test} (the link anchor from the figure is here).
See also \nameref{tab:test}.
\end{document}

Note: You need different target to \namerefwithbackref and \refwithbackref. That's why \captionwithbackrefs uses an additional link for the number and \refwithbackref uses numback: prefix instead of nameback:.