I have "editor.autoSave": "off".

Have you seen any JS errors?
I'm not sure if that's related, but I've seen that for other files very recently. And afterwards, I found the following error logged:
errors.ts:81 Uncaught Error: Cannot read property 'isDisposed' of undefined
TypeError: Cannot read property 'isDisposed' of undefined
at Function.../../packages/plugin-ext/lib/main/browser/text-editor-main.js.TextEditorPropertiesMain.getOptionsFromEditor (text-editor-main.ts:364)
at Function.../../packages/plugin-ext/lib/main/browser/text-editor-main.js.TextEditorPropertiesMain.readFromEditor (text-editor-main.ts:342)
at TextEditorMain.../../packages/plugin-ext/lib/main/browser/text-editor-main.js.TextEditorMain.updateProperties (text-editor-main.ts:56)
at text-editor-main.ts:94
at Emitter.fire (event.ts:140)
at ViewOutgoingEvents.viewEventBus.onDidScroll (codeEditorWidget.ts:433)
at ViewOutgoingEvents.emitScrollChanged (viewOutgoingEvents.ts:45)
at View.onScrollChanged (viewImpl.ts:333)
at ViewEventHandler.handleEvents (viewEventHandler.ts:164)
at ViewEventDispatcher._doConsumeQueue (viewEventDispatcher.ts:89)
at Function.../../packages/plugin-ext/lib/main/browser/text-editor-main.js.TextEditorPropertiesMain.getOptionsFromEditor (text-editor-main.ts:364)
at Function.../../packages/plugin-ext/lib/main/browser/text-editor-main.js.TextEditorPropertiesMain.readFromEditor (text-editor-main.ts:342)
at TextEditorMain.../../packages/plugin-ext/lib/main/browser/text-editor-main.js.TextEditorMain.updateProperties (text-editor-main.ts:56)
at text-editor-main.ts:94
at Emitter.fire (event.ts:140)
at ViewOutgoingEvents.viewEventBus.onDidScroll (codeEditorWidget.ts:433)
at ViewOutgoingEvents.emitScrollChanged (viewOutgoingEvents.ts:45)
at View.onScrollChanged (viewImpl.ts:333)
at ViewEventHandler.handleEvents (viewEventHandler.ts:164)
at ViewEventDispatcher._doConsumeQueue (viewEventDispatcher.ts:89)
at errors.ts:81
Have you seen any JS errors?
No.
in my local environment this only happens to the settings.json created from the "Open Workspace Preferences" menu item:

It could be some formatter thing.
Could be that editorconfig extension聽adds a new line?
@kittaakos, @akosyakov, that's apparently the case for theia repo:
[*.{json,js,ts,md,yml}]
insert_final_newline = true
why is that modification done for opening of files? that seems bogus to me. while looking for something during a PR review I just tempered lots of files without any intend.
ref. #2667
Can we close this then?