Strange things happening with typing

Question

This just started yesterday for seemingly no reason; For some reason whenever I type the cursor will randomly go back of its own accord and highlight the text and then, without my copying it to my clipboard, it will be randomly pasted almost every time I hit a key. I've already tried uninstalling and reinstalling Ubuntu, and at this point, I'm torn between calling a tech guy, and calling an exorcist. Any help is appreciated.

Answer 1

Is this a laptop?

I've seen this kind of thing happen in laptops, where pressing keys on the keyboard has the side effect of tapping the trackpad or buttons. It could be a problem with the computer, or it might just be the user's fingers ever so slightly contacting the trackpad, just enough to register a click. Double-clicking the left button usually highlights whatever text is under the cursor, and middle-clicking will paste whatever was highlighted, so "random" clicks could have this effect easily.

If this applies to you, a few things to try:

Check this setting: System Settings -> Mouse & Touchpad -> Disable while typing (you could also try un-checking Tap to click)

For some reason this often does not work for folks, though. Many other people report that using the syndaemon utility works for them, though I've never needed to use it. The details on how to do that (and some other possibly useful suggestions) can be found in the answers to this question:

Disable Touchpad While Typing does not work