How to jump back to the last position of the cursor in emacs?

Question

In emacs, when i am editing a program, and miss-input some command and make the cursor jump to somewhere in other files. Is there a short-cut key or command to jump back to the last location of the cursor?

Answer 1

I believe what you are searching for is pop-global-mark, usually bound to C-x C-@ and C-x C-SPC.

The global mark ring is updated automatically on many occasions such as buffer switching, accidental or otherwise.

Answer 2

You can use the command previous-buffer which in my version (GNU Emacs 23.2.1) is bound to C-x left-arrow by default.

Just type Meta-x describe-key C-x left for further information

There is also winner-mode that binds C-c left arrow to winner-undo which in short allows you to undo any change done to your windows.

Answer 3

C-x C-x

It will also highlight everything between your previous cursor location and the new location (if you want to get rid of the highlighting, just C-g). You can set the location where you will jump back to with C-space. So, for example, you might plan to use this with:

cursor at the start of a paragraph

C-space

move cursor to the end of the paragraph

C-x C-x

(the entire paragraph is now highlighted)

M-w

(the paragraph is now in the copy buffer, ready to be pasted elsewhere with C-y)