System Information
macOS 10.12.3 (16D32)
MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Early 2013)
NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M 1024 MB
Intel HD Graphics 4000 1536 MB
Blender Version
Broken: 2.78a
Worked: 2.49b
Short description of error
View locking against an object does not work in 2.78a. I happened to have 2.49b on my system as well so I did it there for a sanity check and it works fine. Per the 2.78 manual it should still work the way it used to:
Lock to Object
Lock to Object lets you define an object in the Object Data ID as the center of the view. In that case, the view can be rotated around or zoomed towards that central object, but not on translation, unless you translate that itself object. (This option is not available in a camera view).
Exact steps for others to reproduce the error
Open a new Blender file
Open Properties panel in 3D view
Under View->Lock to Object
Select the Cube
Translate your view (you should not be able to, but you can)