Are the logs in /var/log/ automatically rotated?

[Paul Howarth]

Don Bedsole wrote:
> Hi,
> I was wondering if the logs in the /var/log directory 
> (especially /var/log/messages) are automatically deleted after a certain 
> period of time or when the log file gets to a certain size.  Or, is this 
> something that needs to be set up manually by the user using a cron job or 
> something like that?  I have just changed my iptables rules to include some 
> logging and the messages go to /var/log/messages.  I'm not too worried about 
> getting my hard drive filled up with log messages, but I don't want to save 
> them forever either. Thank you.

They're rotated on a weekly basis, with IIRC five weeks' messages kept.

See /etc/logrotate.d/syslog

Paul.