Thanks, you perfectly address what I want to do. I already do use the navigation bar within the docked cell (which you show above) to move around within a section file. The way this is done is shown below. I got the code to set up the navigation menu in the docked cell from Tom Wickham Jones.
(* *************************************************************************************** *) CreateLinks[nb_] := Module[{tagLis = {},data}, SelectionMove[nb, Before, Notebook]; While[(SelectionMove[nb, Next, Cell]; data = NotebookRead[nb]) =!= {}, tagLis = Join[tagLis, Cases[data, Rule[CellTags, tg_] :> tg]]]; MapThread[#1 :> {NotebookLocate[#1], FrontEndExecute[{FrontEndToken[ "SelectionOpenAllGroups"]}]} &, {tagLis}]] (* *************************************************************************************** *) Options[BuildDockedCell] = {dockedcellcontent -> Cell[TextData[{"Tutorials on Probabilistic Seismic Hazard Analysis", StyleBox["\nFrank Scherbaum ", FontSize -> 14], StyleBox[" University of Potsdam", FontSize -> 12, FontSlant -> "Italic"]}], FontFamily -> "Helvetica", CellMargins -> {{0, 0}, {0, 0}}, TextAlignment -> -0.5`, FontSize -> 20, FontColor -> ColorData["HTML"]["Gold"], Background -> ColorData["HTML"]["MidnightBlue"]], navigationMenuHeader->"Figures",manuscriptdir->$HomeDirectory}; BuildDockedCell[manuscriptname_, opts : OptionsPattern[]] := Module[{nb, dcell1, menucell}, SetOptions[OpenManuscript,FilterRules[{Options[BuildDockedCell]},Options[OpenManuscript]]]; SetOptions[OpenManuscript,FilterRules[{opts},Options[OpenManuscript]]]; nb = OpenManuscript[manuscriptname]; dcell1 = OptionValue[dockedcellcontent]; If[dcell1 =!= None, menucell = Cell[BoxData@ToBoxes@Grid[{{ ActionMenu[ Row[{OptionValue[navigationMenuHeader]}], CreateLinks[nb], ImageSize -> {85,25}, ImageMargins -> 0, FrameMargins -> 0, BaseStyle -> {"MSG", 12}]}}, Spacings -> {0.5, 0.5}, Alignment -> {Left, Top}], "DockedCell", Background -> GrayLevel[0.95]]; SetOptions[nb,DockedCells -> {dcell1, menucell}], SetOptions[nb,DockedCells ->Inherited]]; nb ] (* *************************************************************************************** *) Options[BuildDockedCellWithGoBackButton] = {dockedcellcontent -> Cell[TextData[{"Tutorials on Probabilistic Seismic Hazard Analysis", StyleBox["\nFrank Scherbaum ", FontSize -> 14], StyleBox[" University of Potsdam", FontSize -> 12, FontSlant -> "Italic"]}], FontFamily -> "Helvetica", CellMargins -> {{0, 0}, {0, 0}}, TextAlignment -> -0.5`, FontSize -> 20, FontColor -> ColorData["HTML"]["Gold"], Background -> ColorData["HTML"]["MidnightBlue"]], navigationMenuHeader->"Figures",manuscriptdir->$HomeDirectory}; BuildDockedCellWithGoBackButton[manuscriptname_,opts:OptionsPattern[]] := Module[{nb, dcell1, gobackbutton, goforwardbutton,menuitem}, SetOptions[OpenManuscript,FilterRules[{Options[BuildDockedCellWithGoBackButton]},Options[OpenManuscript]]]; SetOptions[OpenManuscript,FilterRules[{opts},Options[OpenManuscript]]]; nb = OpenManuscript[manuscriptname]; dcell1 = OptionValue[dockedcellcontent]; If[dcell1 =!= None, menuitem = Grid[{{ ActionMenu[ Row[{OptionValue[navigationMenuHeader]}], CreateLinks[nb], ImageSize -> {85,25}, ImageMargins -> 0, FrameMargins -> 0, BaseStyle -> {"MSG", 12}]}}, Spacings -> {0.5, 0.5}, Alignment -> {Left, Top} ]; gobackbutton = Button["<", FrontEnd`FrontEndExecute[ FrontEnd`FrontEndToken[ButtonNotebook[], "HyperlinkGoBack"]], Evaluator -> None]; goforwardbutton = Button[">", FrontEnd`FrontEndExecute[ FrontEnd`FrontEndToken[ButtonNotebook[], "HyperlinkGoForward"]], Evaluator -> None]; SetOptions[nb, DockedCells -> {dcell1, Cell[BoxData[ ToBoxes[Row[{gobackbutton, goforwardbutton, " ", menuitem}]]], "DockedCell", Background -> GrayLevel[0.95]]}] , SetOptions[nb,DockedCells ->Inherited]]; nb]
For my workflow, I simply wanted to check each section file in the CDF player separately but then put them together into a single book file. I haven´t yet checked if this makes sense at all.
By the way, for my own workflow, I have generated eBookUtilities package which contains all the material I collected (primarily from Eric Schulz and Tom Wickham Jones) for this purpose. It now contains quite a bit of stuff which I no longe ruse since my workflow has changed quite a bit but some of it may be interesting for others . I´d be happy to share it with anybody who is interested but it may need some QA. Below is the main guide page.
eBookUtilities
This is a collection of tools to facilitate the production of electronic books using Mathematica. Starting point was the material genererously shared by Eric Schulz and which was presented at the Wolfram Technology Conference 2011 in his presentation Sharing Wisdom Gained From Publishing a CDF eBook.
updateStylesheet \[LongDash] updates the style sheets in a list of notebooks
MakeCombinedManuscript \[LongDash] generates a combined manuscript notebook (with all material from file supportfilename)
MakeCleanManuscript \[LongDash] generates a cleaned manuscript notebook file from which output cells, etc. are removed
MakeCleanCDF \[LongDash] generates clean CDF from the combined manuscript notebook
SaveNotebookAsCleanCDF \[LongDash] saves input notebook directly as clean CDF with docked cell
BuildDockedCell \[FilledVerySmallSquare] BuildDockedCellWithGoBackButton \[FilledVerySmallSquare] CDFdir . CloseManuscript \[FilledVerySmallSquare] CloseSupport \[FilledVerySmallSquare] combinedCleanNBdir \[FilledVerySmallSquare] combinedNBdir \[FilledVerySmallSquare] dockedcellcontent \[FilledVerySmallSquare] CreateFigureCell \[FilledVerySmallSquare] CreateImageCell \[FilledVerySmallSquare] CreateLinks \[FilledVerySmallSquare] CreateTableCell \[FilledVerySmallSquare] DeleteDockedCell \[FilledVerySmallSquare] EvaluateManuscript \[FilledVerySmallSquare] EvaluateSupport \[FilledVerySmallSquare] MakeCleanCDF \[FilledVerySmallSquare] MakeCleanManuscript \[FilledVerySmallSquare] makeCleanUpPalette \[FilledVerySmallSquare] MakeCombinedManuscript \[FilledVerySmallSquare] makeHideCodePalette \[FilledVerySmallSquare] makePrivateFontsPalette \[FilledVerySmallSquare] manuscriptdir \[FilledVerySmallSquare] navigationMenuHeader \[FilledVerySmallSquare] NumberOfColors \[FilledVerySmallSquare] OpenManuscript \[FilledVerySmallSquare] OpenSupport \[FilledVerySmallSquare] SaveManuscript \[FilledVerySmallSquare] SaveNotebookAsCleanCDF \[FilledVerySmallSquare] SaveSupport \[FilledVerySmallSquare] setAutoReplacements . stylesheetdir \[FilledVerySmallSquare] stylesheetfile \[FilledVerySmallSquare] supportfiledir \[FilledVerySmallSquare] updateCurrentStylesheet \[FilledVerySmallSquare] updateStylesheet
TUTORIALS
How to organize the writing process
Link to chapter 3 secton 1