Linux – Log file size limit

cronlinuxlog-filesloggingUbuntu

I have a script which runs every 5 minutes by cron, with >> path/logfile.log appended to store the output. Let's say I have this script running several years; do I have to worry about this file getting to big, i.e. do I have to manually shorten it down regularly?

Best Answer

do I have to worry about this file getting to big,

Well, assuming you've not invented an infinite storage device, then yes this is something good to think about.

i.e. do I have to manually shorten it down regularly?

Look into logrotate, which is a standard method of maintaining log files that ships with every distribution.

Related Solutions

Linux Bash – How to Sort du -h Output by Size

As of GNU coreutils 7.5 released in August 2009, sort allows a -h parameter, which allows numeric suffixes of the kind produced by du -h:

du -hs * | sort -h

If you are using a sort that does not support -h, you can install GNU Coreutils. E.g. on an older Mac OS X:

brew install coreutils
du -hs * | gsort -h

From sort manual:

-h, --human-numeric-sort compare human readable numbers (e.g., 2K 1G)

Cron – How to Prevent Duplicate Cron Jobs Running

There are a couple of programs that automate this feature, take away the annoyance and potential bugs from doing this yourself, and avoid the stale lock problem by using flock behind the scenes, too (which is a risk if you're just using touch). I've used lockrun and lckdo in the past, but now there's flock(1) (in newish versions of util-linux) which is great. It's really easy to use:

* * * * * /usr/bin/flock -n /tmp/fcj.lockfile /usr/local/bin/frequent_cron_job

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Linux Bash – How to Sort du -h Output by Size

Cron – How to Prevent Duplicate Cron Jobs Running

Related Topic