Most people know that the at-command is used for replaying macros. However, most don't realize that this is just a normal register, and that you can copy/paste and even edit these macros.

Very very friggin useful.

(note: below, wherever ^M is mentioned, enter it using: ctrl-V, ctrl-M.

Things I commonly use the at-command for:

• When doing more complex :!% commands (ie. for scripting languages), such as piping the output to `less` or running `perl -c %`, I'll put these in the register. These are so handy to keep around, and some are script-specific, that I often store these in the comments at the top of the script, so I'll always be sure I can restore the register in case it ever gets overwritten.

  :!% 2>&1|less -i^M
  :!% 2>/dev/null|less -i^M
  :!%|grep -i only-show-lines-with-these|less -1^M
      

  When a script outputs ANSI colors, this is useful:

  :!% 2>&1|less -i -raw^M