Sometimes I need to see more about the portion of text or code I am editing: let's say I'm near the window's bottom, and I'd like to see what's after, but without moving the point. The function recenter does that but it's not always obvious to compute the argument you should give to it (for example C-u - 1 0 C-l would make sure the point is 10 lines before the bottom of the window, but if you really meant 11… you must do it again).

This little code makes <M-up> and <M-down> scroll the “viewport”, that is exactly the opposite of regular scrolling: the point doesn't move, the window does.

;; viewport scrolling
(defun scroll-viewport (n)
  (let ((top (line-number-at-pos (window-start)))
        (cur (line-number-at-pos (point))))
    (recenter (+ (- cur top) n))))
 
(global-set-key (kbd "<M-up>") (lambda (arg) 
                                 (interactive "p")
                                 (or arg (setq arg 1))
                                 (scroll-viewport (- arg))))
 
(global-set-key (kbd "<M-down>") (lambda (arg) 
                                   (interactive "p")
                                   (or arg (setq arg 1))
                                   (scroll-viewport arg)))