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syslogubuntu-20.04

syslog and kern.log files are massive

I got a warning that my PC was running out of space and noticed that /var/log had taken up nearly 190 Gb. On further inspection, noticed that the kern.log and syslog files are massive, after running du -sh *|grep G

Currently running Ubuntu 20.04.

What is the reason for this and is it safe to delete these log files?

Screenshot of log file sizes

Solution

  • Simple steps to clean and create both syslog and kern.log

    Create a sh file eg. refresh.sh and save the following code.

    echo "" > /var/log/kern.log
echo "" > /var/log/syslog
service syslog restart
journalctl --vacuum-size=50M

    run it as root eg. sudo sh refresh.sh

    It will clear the logs from

    /var/log/syslog
/var/log/kern.log
/run/log/journal