how to disable vertical auto-centering of cursor

[Russ P.]

I recently had my Ubuntu Linux upgraded to 14.04, and my emacs got upgraded to 24.3.1 in the process. I noticed that it scrolls by itself. I finally realized that it automatically centers the cursor vertically after a few seconds. This is extremely annoying to me. I decided to give it a try for an hour or so to see if I can get used to it, but it still annoys me. I went to the options menu, but I see nothing about that feature. Can anyone tell me how to disable it? Thanks.

[N. Jackson]

Post by Russ P.
I recently had my Ubuntu Linux upgraded to 14.04, and my emacs got
upgraded to 24.3.1 in the process. I noticed that it scrolls by
itself.

This suggests teleprompter-like behaviour; I'm guessing that isn't
exactly what you mean?

Post by Russ P.
I finally realized that it automatically centers the cursor
vertically after a few seconds.

As far as I know, for years Emacs has had the behaviour of trying to
keep point centred vertically in the window, and I think this is what
you are describing?

Post by Russ P.
This is extremely annoying to me.

Apparently some people like it; it allows them to read with their eyes
always roughly at the same level on the screen.

Fortunately, as of, I think, version 24.1, it is easy to turn off.

Post by Russ P.
I decided to give it a try for an hour or so to see if I can get used
to it, but it still annoys me. I went to the options menu, but I see
nothing about that feature. Can anyone tell me how to disable it?

Have a look at the docstring for scroll-conservatively.

C-h v scroll-conservatively

Simply set this variable to a value above 100 to make Emacs scrolling
behaviour similar to that of other programs. There is a link on that
Help page to allow you to customize the value. Alternatively put
something like

(setq scroll-conservatively 101)

in your .emacs (or other Emacs init file).

[Russ P.]

Post by N. Jackson

Post by Russ P.
I recently had my Ubuntu Linux upgraded to 14.04, and my emacs got
upgraded to 24.3.1 in the process. I noticed that it scrolls by
itself.

This suggests teleprompter-like behaviour; I'm guessing that isn't
exactly what you mean?

Post by Russ P.
I finally realized that it automatically centers the cursor
vertically after a few seconds.

As far as I know, for years Emacs has had the behaviour of trying to
keep point centred vertically in the window, and I think this is what
you are describing?

Post by Russ P.
This is extremely annoying to me.

Apparently some people like it; it allows them to read with their eyes
always roughly at the same level on the screen.

I seriously doubt that anyone wants this behavior. I go to type something and the buffer scrolls by itself so I end up typing in the wrong place. Every time I scroll manually, I have to wait a few seconds for it to adjust, then I have to figure out where I am again. As I said, extremely annoying.

Post by N. Jackson
Fortunately, as of, I think, version 24.1, it is easy to turn off.

Post by Russ P.
I decided to give it a try for an hour or so to see if I can get used
to it, but it still annoys me. I went to the options menu, but I see
nothing about that feature. Can anyone tell me how to disable it?

Have a look at the docstring for scroll-conservatively.
C-h v scroll-conservatively
Simply set this variable to a value above 100 to make Emacs scrolling
behaviour similar to that of other programs. There is a link on that
Help page to allow you to customize the value. Alternatively put
something like
(setq scroll-conservatively 101)
in your .emacs (or other Emacs init file).

I tried that, but it did not seem to make any difference.

Over at emacs.stackexchange they said that this bug was fixed in 24.4, but I did not find that to be true.

[N. Jackson]

Post by Russ P.

Post by N. Jackson

Post by Russ P.
I recently had my Ubuntu Linux upgraded to 14.04, and my emacs got
upgraded to 24.3.1 in the process. I noticed that it scrolls by
itself. I finally realized that it automatically centers the cursor
vertically after a few seconds. This is extremely annoying to me.

Apparently some people like it; it allows them to read with their eyes
always roughly at the same level on the screen.

I seriously doubt that anyone wants this behavior. I go to type
something and the buffer scrolls by itself so I end up typing in the
wrong place. Every time I scroll manually, I have to wait a few
seconds for it to adjust, then I have to figure out where I am again.
As I said, extremely annoying.

Ah, yes, that sounds awful -- closer to "unusable" than "annoying"!
Neither the jumping around nor (unless the file is huge) the long delays
are normal. Definitely a bug or somthing very wrong with your settings.
Either way, reporting it as a bug should get it resolved. See
http://debbugs.gnu.org/Emacs.html for instructions for reporting Emacs
bugs.

When you're making your bug report, I'd recommend being slightly more
concrete/detailed about exactly what you see happening and what you have
to do to make it happen. For example, does the problem still occur when
you start Emacs with 'emacs -Q'? Does it only happen when editing
specific files or does it happen with every file? Does it start
happenning as soon as you start Emacs or some time later?

[Russ P.]

Post by N. Jackson
As far as I know, for years Emacs has had the behaviour of trying to
keep point centred vertically in the window, and I think this is what
you are describing?

Post by Russ P.
This is extremely annoying to me.

Apparently some people like it; it allows them to read with their eyes
always roughly at the same level on the screen.

Let just add one more thing. Keeping the cursor centered might be useful if it stayed centered and the buffer just scrolled behind it. But that is not what is happening now. Instead, the cursor moves, then the buffer jerks it back to the center a few seconds later. That is no good. It is particularly annoying when scroll down a page at a time, because the cursor jerks from the top or bottom of the screen to the center.

[Russ P.]

After some googling I learned that this is a known bug. I upgraded to 24.4.1 and it was fixed. Thanks.

Post by Russ P.
I recently had my Ubuntu Linux upgraded to 14.04, and my emacs got upgraded to 24.3.1 in the process. I noticed that it scrolls by itself. I finally realized that it automatically centers the cursor vertically after a few seconds. This is extremely annoying to me. I decided to give it a try for an hour or so to see if I can get used to it, but it still annoys me. I went to the options menu, but I see nothing about that feature. Can anyone tell me how to disable it? Thanks.

[Russ P.]

Now I realize that it wasn't fixed after all. Still f'd up.

Post by Russ P.
After some googling I learned that this is a known bug. I upgraded to 24.4.1 and it was fixed. Thanks.

Post by Russ P.
I recently had my Ubuntu Linux upgraded to 14.04, and my emacs got upgraded to 24.3.1 in the process. I noticed that it scrolls by itself. I finally realized that it automatically centers the cursor vertically after a few seconds. This is extremely annoying to me. I decided to give it a try for an hour or so to see if I can get used to it, but it still annoys me. I went to the options menu, but I see nothing about that feature. Can anyone tell me how to disable it? Thanks.

[Russ P.]

I finally tracked it down to this line in my .emacs file:

(setq global-auto-revert-non-file-buffers 0)

Post by Russ P.
I recently had my Ubuntu Linux upgraded to 14.04, and my emacs got upgraded to 24.3.1 in the process. I noticed that it scrolls by itself. I finally realized that it automatically centers the cursor vertically after a few seconds. This is extremely annoying to me. I decided to give it a try for an hour or so to see if I can get used to it, but it still annoys me. I went to the options menu, but I see nothing about that feature. Can anyone tell me how to disable it? Thanks.