" A little nice idea I got today...
"
" I've noticed that I often use one session mappings .. Sometimes :bn
" sometimes :make specialtarget
" in each case I need it often.
" vim supports this by @: but there are cases when I want to press one key only
" and other cases I want to user other commands as well.
" Having to type :map <F5> :<cmd><CR> does need some time and I'm lazy ;-)
" So just copy this text, put it into .vim/plugins/mapFromF1ToF12.vim and enjoy
" Try
" :echo "dummy"<CR>
" <F5>
" now you can use F5 to execute :echo "dummy"
" Perhaps you want to have mappings local to your buffer only.
" Then use map <buffer> and unmap <buffer> instead

function MapLastCommandToKeys(keysToMapTo)
  exe "unmap ".a:keysToMapTo
  exe "map ".a:keysToMapTo." :".histget("cmd")."<CR>"
endfunction

function PrepareMap(keysToMapTo)
  exe "map ".a:keysToMapTo." :call MapLastCommandToKeys('".a:keysToMapTo."')<CR>"
endfunction

" This will allow you to use F1
PrepareMap('<F1>')
" This while loop will allow you to use F2,F3,..,F12
let i=2
while i<13
  call PrepareMap('<F'.i.'>')
  let i=i+1
endwhile
" of cause you can use any mapping eg \a:
PrepareMap("\a")

CommentsEdit

Recordings can do much more (encompassing other modes) than handle :cmd-line executions. They can also be repeated. See :help complex-repeat.

From normal mode,

1. To record to register a: 'qa'
2. Perform any keystrokes and :cmd-line executions.
3. To stop recording: 'q'
4. To perform recording 2 times: '2@a'
5. To perform recording 55 more times: '55@@'