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If the cursor is placed on a whitespace and there're multiple whitespaces between 2 words, how can I move the cursor backwards to the end of the 1st word?

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  • Very closely related: emacs.stackexchange.com/q/4271/115 – Kaushal Modi Aug 5 '16 at 14:48
  • M-b M-f? Your description is not too clear ("first word"?). Try giving a concrete example, showing where the cursor is and just where you want to move it. – Drew Aug 5 '16 at 16:39
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You could call forward-whitespace with a negative prefix argument. You can bind this to a key with a lambda. For example, bind it to M-B:

(global-set-key (kbd "M-B") (lambda () (interactive) (forward-whitespace -1)))
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2

You could

  1. move cursor to the beginning of the first word with M-b (backward-word)
  2. and then move forward with M-f (forward-word), which place cursor after the end of the first word.

For example (* means point):

0: first    *   second
1: *first       second
2: first*       second

If you want always go to the end of the word when moving backward, then use in init.el

(defun backward-word-end ()
  "Move backward to the end of the word."
  (interactive)
  (backward-word 2)
  (forward-word))

(global-set-key (kbd "M-b") 'backward-word-end)

P.S. But don't forget about local-set-key and bind-key if you use package.

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  • 1
    A note that the backward-word-end function you wrote might not always work as intended.. What if the point is already at the end of a word? IMO, the M-b M-f approach you mention above is the best bet here. – Kaushal Modi Aug 5 '16 at 13:18
  • That's how I do that now, but I don't want to anymore. I want to move it to the end of a word immediately. – Johshi Aug 5 '16 at 14:36
  • I don't want to overwrite the default behaviour of M-b. – Johshi Aug 5 '16 at 14:37

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