logrotate

LOGROTATE(8)             System Administrator's Manual            LOGROTATE(8)

NAME
       logrotate - rotates, compresses, and mails system logs

SYNOPSIS
       logrotate  [--debug]  [--verbose] [--log file] [--force] [--state file]
       [--mail command] config_file [config_file2 ...]

DESCRIPTION
       logrotate is designed to ease administration of systems  that  generate
       large numbers of log files.  It allows automatic rotation, compression,
       removal, and mailing of log files.  Each log file may be handled daily,
       weekly, monthly, or when it grows too large.

       Normally,  logrotate  is run as a daily cron job.  It will not modify a
       log more than once in one day unless the  criterion  for  that  log  is
       based  on the log's size and logrotate is being run more than once each
       day, or unless the -f or --force option is used.

       Any number of config files may be given on the command line. Later con-
       fig files may override the options given in earlier files, so the order
       in which the logrotate config files are listed is important.  Normally,
       a  single  config  file which includes any other config files which are
       needed should be used.  See below for more information on  how  to  use
       the  include  directive to accomplish this.  If a directory is given on
       the command line, every file in that directory  is  used  as  a  config
       file.

       If  no  command  line arguments are given, logrotate will print version
       and copyright information, along with a short usage  summary.   If  any
       errors  occur  while  rotating  logs, logrotate will exit with non-zero
       status.

OPTIONS
       -?, --help
              Prints help message.

       -d, --debug
              Turn on debug mode, which means that no changes are made to  the
              logs  and  the  logrotate state file is not updated.  Only debug
              messages are printed.

       -f, --force
              Tells logrotate to force the rotation, even if it doesn't  think
              this  is  necessary.   Sometimes this is useful after adding new
              entries to a logrotate config file, or if  old  log  files  have
              been removed by hand, as the new files will be created, and log-
              ging will continue correctly.

       -l, --log file
              Tells logrotate to log verbose output  into  the  log_file.  The
              verbose  output  logged to that file is the same as when running
              logrotate with -v switch. The log file is overwritten  on  every
              logrotate execution.

       -m, --mail command
              Tells  logrotate  which  command  to use when mailing logs. This
              command should accept the following arguments:

              1) the subject of the message given with '-s subject'
              2) the recipient.

              The command must then read a message on standard input and  mail
              it to the recipient. The default mail command is /usr/bin/mail.

       -s, --state statefile
              Tells  logrotate to use an alternate state file.  This is useful
              if logrotate is being run as a different user for  various  sets
              of log files.  The default state file is /var/lib/logrotate/sta-
              tus.

       --usage
              Prints a short usage message.

       -v, --verbose
              Turns on verbose mode, for example to  display  messages  during
              rotation.

CONFIGURATION FILE
       logrotate  reads  everything  about the log files it should be handling
       from the series of configuration files specified on the  command  line.
       Each configuration file can set global options (local definitions over-
       ride global ones, and later  definitions  override  earlier  ones)  and
       specify  logfiles  to  rotate.  A  simple configuration file looks like
       this:

       # sample logrotate configuration file
       compress

       /var/log/messages {
           rotate 5
           weekly
           postrotate
               /usr/bin/killall -HUP syslogd
           endscript
       }

       "/var/log/httpd/access.log" /var/log/httpd/error.log {
           rotate 5
           mail recipient@example.org
           size 100k
           sharedscripts
           postrotate
               /usr/bin/killall -HUP httpd
           endscript
       }

       /var/log/news/* {
           monthly
           rotate 2
           olddir /var/log/news/old
           missingok
           postrotate
               kill -HUP $(cat /var/run/inn.pid)
           endscript
           nocompress
       }

       ~/log/*.log {}

       The first few lines set global options; in the example, logs  are  com-
       pressed after they are rotated.  Note that comments may appear anywhere
       in the config file as long as the first non-whitespace character on the
       line is a #.

       Values  are  separated from directives by whitespace and/or an optional
       =.  Numbers must be specified in a format understood by strtoul(3).

       The next section of the config file defines how to handle the log  file
       /var/log/messages. The log will go through five weekly rotations before
       being removed. After the log file has been rotated (but before the  old
       version  of  the log has been compressed), the command /usr/bin/killall
       -HUP syslogd will be executed.

       The next section defines the  parameters  for  both  /var/log/httpd/ac-
       cess.log  and  /var/log/httpd/error.log.   Each  is rotated whenever it
       grows over 100k in size, and the old  logs  files  are  mailed  (uncom-
       pressed)  to  recipient@example.org  after  going  through 5 rotations,
       rather than being removed. The sharedscripts means that the  postrotate
       script will only be run once (after the old logs have been compressed),
       not once for each log which is rotated.  Note that log file  names  may
       be  enclosed  in  quotes (and that quotes are required if the name con-
       tains spaces).  Normal shell quoting rules apply,  with  ',  ",  and  \
       characters supported.

       The  next  section  defines  the  parameters  for  all  of the files in
       /var/log/news. Each file is rotated on a monthly basis.  This  is  con-
       sidered  a  single rotation directive and if errors occur for more than
       one file, the log files are not compressed.

       The last section uses tilde expansion to rotate log files in  the  home
       directory of the current user. This is only available, if your glob li-
       brary supports tilde expansion. GNU glob does support this.

       Please use wildcards with caution.  If you specify  *,  logrotate  will
       rotate all files, including previously rotated ones.  A way around this
       is to use the olddir directive  or  a  more  exact  wildcard  (such  as
       *.log).

       Here  is  more information on the directives which may be included in a
       logrotate configuration file:

   DIRECTIVES
       These directives may be included in a logrotate configuration file:

       compress
              Old versions of log files are compressed  with  gzip(1)  by  de-
              fault. See also nocompress.

       compresscmd
              Specifies  which  command to use to compress log files.  The de-
              fault is gzip(1).  See also compress.

       uncompresscmd
              Specifies which command to use to uncompress log files.  The de-
              fault is gunzip(1).

       compressext
              Specifies which extension to use on compressed logfiles, if com-
              pression is enabled.  The default follows that of the configured
              compression command.

       compressoptions
              Command  line  options may be passed to the compression program,
              if one is in use.  The default, for gzip(1), is "-6" (biased to-
              wards  high  compression at the expense of speed).  If you use a
              different compression command, you may need to change  the  com-
              pressoptions to match.

       copy   Make  a  copy  of the log file, but don't change the original at
              all.  This option can be used, for instance, to make a  snapshot
              of  the  current  log  file, or when some other utility needs to
              truncate or parse the file.  When this option is used, the  cre-
              ate  option  will  have  no effect, as the old log file stays in
              place.

       copytruncate
              Truncate the original log file to zero size in place after  cre-
              ating  a copy, instead of moving the old log file and optionally
              creating a new one.  It can be used when some program cannot  be
              told  to  close its logfile and thus might continue writing (ap-
              pending) to the previous log file forever.  Note that there is a
              very  small  time  slice between copying the file and truncating
              it, so some logging data might be lost.   When  this  option  is
              used, the create option will have no effect, as the old log file
              stays in place.

       create mode owner group, create owner group
              Immediately after rotation (before the postrotate script is run)
              the log file is created (with the same name as the log file just
              rotated).  mode specifies the mode for the  log  file  in  octal
              (the  same  as chmod(2)), owner specifies the user name who will
              own the log file, and group specifies the  group  the  log  file
              will  belong  to. Any of the log file attributes may be omitted,
              in which case those attributes for the new  file  will  use  the
              same values as the original log file for the omitted attributes.
              This option can be disabled using the nocreate option.

       createolddir mode owner group
              If the directory specified by olddir directive does  not  exist,
              it  is created. mode specifies the mode for the olddir directory
              in octal (the same as chmod(2)), owner specifies the  user  name
              who will own the olddir directory, and group specifies the group
              the olddir directory will belong to. This option can be disabled
              using the nocreateolddir option.

       daily  Log files are rotated every day.

       dateext
              Archive  old  versions of log files adding a date extension like
              YYYYMMDD instead of simply adding a number. The extension may be
              configured using the dateformat and dateyesterday options.

       dateformat format_string
              Specify  the extension for dateext using the notation similar to
              strftime(3) function. Only %Y %m %d %H %M %S %V  and  %s  speci-
              fiers  are allowed.  The default value is -%Y%m%d except hourly,
              which uses -%Y%m%d%H as default value.  Note that also the char-
              acter  separating  log  name  from  the extension is part of the
              dateformat string. The system clock must be  set  past  Sep  9th
              2001  for %s to work correctly.  Note that the datestamps gener-
              ated by this format must be lexically sortable  (that  is  first
              the year, then the month then the day. For example 2001/12/01 is
              ok, but 01/12/2001 is not, since  01/11/2002  would  sort  lower
              while  it  is later).  This is because when using the rotate op-
              tion, logrotate sorts all rotated filenames to  find  out  which
              logfiles are older and should be removed.

       dateyesterday
              Use  yesterday's  instead  of today's date to create the dateext
              extension, so that the rotated log file has a date in  its  name
              that is the same as the timestamps within it.

       datehourago
              Use  hour  ago instead of current date to create the dateext ex-
              tension, so that the rotated log file has a  hour  in  its  name
              that  is  the same as the timestamps within it.  Useful with ro-
              tate hourly.

       delaycompress
              Postpone compression of the previous log file to the next  rota-
              tion  cycle.  This only has effect when used in combination with
              compress.  It can be used when some program cannot  be  told  to
              close  its logfile and thus might continue writing to the previ-
              ous log file for some time.

       extension ext
              Log files with ext extension can keep it after the rotation.  If
              compression  is  used,  the compression extension (normally .gz)
              appears after ext. For example you  have  a  logfile  named  my-
              log.foo  and  want to rotate it to mylog.1.foo.gz instead of my-
              log.foo.1.gz.

       hourly Log files are rotated every hour. Note that usually logrotate is
              configured to be run by cron daily. You have to change this con-
              figuration and run logrotate hourly to be able to really  rotate
              logs hourly.

       addextension ext
              Log  files  are given the final extension ext after rotation. If
              the original file already ends with ext, the  extension  is  not
              duplicated,  but  merely moved to the end, that is both filename
              and filenameext would get rotated to filename.1ext. If  compres-
              sion  is  used, the compression extension (normally .gz) appears
              after ext.

       ifempty
              Rotate the log file even if it  is  empty,  overriding  the  no-
              tifempty option (ifempty is the default).

       include file_or_directory
              Reads the file given as an argument as if it was included inline
              where the include directive appears. If a  directory  is  given,
              most of the files in that directory are read in alphabetic order
              before processing of the  including  file  continues.  The  only
              files  which  are  ignored are files which are not regular files
              (such as directories and named pipes) and files whose names  end
              with  one  of  the taboo extensions or patterns, as specified by
              the tabooext or taboopat directives, respectively.

       mail address
              When a log is rotated out of existence, it is mailed to address.
              If  no  mail should be generated by a particular log, the nomail
              directive may be used.

       mailfirst
              When using the mail command, mail the just-rotated file, instead
              of the about-to-expire file.

       maillast
              When  using the mail command, mail the about-to-expire file, in-
              stead of the just-rotated file (this is the default).

       minage count
              Do not rotate logs which are less than <count> days old.

       maxage count
              Remove rotated logs older than <count> days.  The  age  is  only
              checked if the logfile is to be rotated. The files are mailed to
              the configured address if maillast and mail are configured.

       maxsize size
              Log files are rotated when they grow bigger than size bytes even
              before  the additionally specified time interval (daily, weekly,
              monthly, or yearly).  The related size option is similar  except
              that  it  is  mutually exclusive with the time interval options,
              and it causes log files to be rotated  without  regard  for  the
              last  rotation  time.   When  maxsize is used, both the size and
              timestamp of a log file are considered.

       minsize  size
              Log files are rotated when they grow bigger than size bytes, but
              not  before  the  additionally  specified  time interval (daily,
              weekly, monthly, or yearly).  The related size option is similar
              except  that it is mutually exclusive with the time interval op-
              tions, and it causes log files to be rotated without regard  for
              the last rotation time.  When minsize is used, both the size and
              timestamp of a log file are considered.

       missingok
              If the log file is missing, go on to the next one without  issu-
              ing an error message. See also nomissingok.

       monthly
              Log files are rotated the first time logrotate is run in a month
              (this is normally on the first day of the month).

       nocompress
              Old versions of log files are not compressed. See also compress.

       nocopy Do not copy the original log file and leave it in place.   (this
              overrides the copy option).

       nocopytruncate
              Do  not truncate the original log file in place after creating a
              copy (this overrides the copytruncate option).

       nocreate
              New log files are not created (this  overrides  the  create  op-
              tion).

       nocreateolddir
              olddir  directory  is  not created by logrotate when it does not
              exist.

       nodelaycompress
              Do not postpone compression of the previous log file to the next
              rotation cycle (this overrides the delaycompress option).

       nodateext
              Do  not  archive   old versions of log files with date extension
              (this overrides the dateext option).

       nomail Do not mail old log files to any address.

       nomissingok
              If a log file does not exist, issue an error. This  is  the  de-
              fault.

       noolddir
              Logs  are rotated in the directory they normally reside in (this
              overrides the olddir option).

       nosharedscripts
              Run prerotate and postrotate scripts for every log file which is
              rotated  (this  is  the default, and overrides the sharedscripts
              option). The absolute path to the log file is  passed  as  first
              argument  to the script. If the scripts exit with error, the re-
              maining actions will not be executed for the affected log only.

       noshred
              Do not use shred when deleting old log files. See also shred.

       notifempty
              Do not rotate the log if it is empty (this overrides the ifempty
              option).

       olddir directory
              Logs  are  moved into directory for rotation. The directory must
              be on the same physical device as the log  file  being  rotated,
              unless  copy, copytruncate or renamecopy option is used. The di-
              rectory is assumed to be relative to the directory  holding  the
              log  file  unless  an absolute path name is specified. When this
              option is used all old versions of the log end up in  directory.
              This option may be overridden by the noolddir option.

       postrotate/endscript
              The  lines  between postrotate and endscript (both of which must
              appear on lines by themselves) are executed (using /bin/sh)  af-
              ter  the  log  file is rotated. These directives may only appear
              inside a log file definition. Normally, the absolute path to the
              log  file  is passed as first argument to the script. If shared-
              scripts is specified, whole pattern is  passed  to  the  script.
              See  also  prerotate.  See sharedscripts and nosharedscripts for
              error handling.

       prerotate/endscript
              The lines between prerotate and endscript (both  of  which  must
              appear  on lines by themselves) are executed (using /bin/sh) be-
              fore the log file is rotated and only if the log  will  actually
              be  rotated.  These directives may only appear inside a log file
              definition. Normally, the absolute  path  to  the  log  file  is
              passed  as  first  argument to the script.  If  sharedscripts is
              specified, whole pattern is passed  to  the  script.   See  also
              postrotate.   See  sharedscripts  and  nosharedscripts for error
              handling.

       firstaction/endscript
              The lines between firstaction and endscript (both of which  must
              appear on lines by themselves) are executed (using /bin/sh) once
              before all log files that match the wildcarded pattern  are  ro-
              tated,  before  prerotate script is run and only if at least one
              log will actually be rotated.  These directives may only  appear
              inside  a  log  file  definition. Whole pattern is passed to the
              script as first argument. If the script  exits  with  error,  no
              further processing is done. See also lastaction.

       lastaction/endscript
              The  lines  between lastaction and endscript (both of which must
              appear on lines by themselves) are executed (using /bin/sh) once
              after  all  log  files that match the wildcarded pattern are ro-
              tated, after postrotate script is run and only if at  least  one
              log  is  rotated.  These directives may only appear inside a log
              file definition. Whole pattern is passed to the script as  first
              argument.  If the script exits with error, just an error message
              is shown (as this is the last action). See also firstaction.

       preremove/endscript
              The lines between preremove and endscript (both  of  which  must
              appear on lines by themselves) are executed (using /bin/sh) once
              just before removal of a log file.  The logrotate will pass  the
              name of file which is soon to be removed. See also firstaction.

       rotate count
              Log files are rotated count times before being removed or mailed
              to the address specified in a mail directive. If count is 0, old
              versions are removed rather than rotated. Default is 0.

       renamecopy
              Log  file is renamed to temporary filename in the same directory
              by adding ".tmp" extension to it. After that, postrotate  script
              is  run  and log file is copied from temporary filename to final
              filename. This allows storing rotated log files on the different
              devices  using  olddir directive. In the end, temporary filename
              is removed.

       size size
              Log files are rotated only if they grow bigger than size  bytes.
              If  size  is  followed  by k, the size is assumed to be in kilo-
              bytes.  If the M is used, the size is in megabytes, and if G  is
              used,  the  size  is  in gigabytes. So size 100, size 100k, size
              100M and size 100G are all valid.

       sharedscripts
              Normally, prerotate and postrotate scripts are run for each  log
              which is rotated and the absolute path to the log file is passed
              as first argument to the script. That means a single script  may
              be  run multiple times for log file entries which match multiple
              files (such as the /var/log/news/* example). If sharedscripts is
              specified,  the  scripts  are  only run once, no matter how many
              logs match the wildcarded pattern, and whole pattern  is  passed
              to  them.   However,  if none of the logs in the pattern require
              rotating, the scripts will not be run at  all.  If  the  scripts
              exit  with error, the remaining actions will not be executed for
              any logs. This option overrides the nosharedscripts  option  and
              implies create option.

       shred  Delete  log  files  using  shred  -u  instead of unlink().  This
              should ensure that logs are not readable after  their  scheduled
              deletion; this is off by default.  See also noshred.

       shredcycles count
              Asks  GNU  shred(1)  to  overwrite  log files count times before
              deletion.  Without this option, shred's default will be used.

       start count
              This is the number to use as the base for rotation. For example,
              if  you  specify 0, the logs will be created with a .0 extension
              as they are rotated from the original log files.  If you specify
              9,  log  files  will  be created with a .9, skipping 0-8.  Files
              will still be rotated the number of times specified with the ro-
              tate directive.

       su user group
              Rotate  log files set under this user and group instead of using
              default user/group (usually root). user specifies the user  name
              used  for  rotation and group specifies the group used for rota-
              tion. If the user/group you specify here does  not  have  suffi-
              cient  privilege  to make files with the ownership you've speci-
              fied in a create instruction, it will cause an error.

       tabooext [+] list
              The current taboo extension list is changed (see the include di-
              rective  for  information  on the taboo extensions). If a + pre-
              cedes the list of extensions, the current taboo  extension  list
              is  augmented,  otherwise  it is replaced. At startup, the taboo
              extension list ,v, .cfsaved,  .disabled,  .dpkg-bak,  .dpkg-del,
              .dpkg-dist,  .dpkg-new, .dpkg-old, .rhn-cfg-tmp-*, .rpmnew, .rp-
              morig, .rpmsave, .swp, .ucf-dist, .ucf-new, .ucf-old, ~

       taboopat [+] list
              The current taboo glob pattern list is changed (see the  include
              directive for information on the taboo extensions and patterns).
              If a + precedes the list of patterns, the current taboo  pattern
              list  is  augmented,  otherwise  it is replaced. At startup, the
              taboo pattern list is empty.

       weekly [weekday]
              Log files are rotated once each weekday, or if the date  is  ad-
              vanced  by at least 7 days since the last rotation (while ignor-
              ing the exact time).  The weekday interpretation  is  following:
              0  means Sunday, 1 means Monday, ..., 6 means Saturday; the spe-
              cial value 7 means each 7 days, irrespectively of weekday.   De-
              faults to 0 if the weekday argument is omitted.

       yearly Log files are rotated if the current year is not the same as the
              last rotation.

FILES
       /var/lib/logrotate/status   Default state file.
       /etc/logrotate.conf         Configuration options.

SEE ALSO
       chmod(2), gunzip(1),  gzip(1),  mail(1),  shred(1),  strftime(3),  str-
       toul(3), <https://github.com/logrotate/logrotate>

AUTHORS
       Erik Troan, Preston Brown, Jan Kaluza.

       <https://github.com/logrotate/logrotate>

Linux                               3.14.0                        LOGROTATE(8)
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