1. Log files are rotated daily or weekly by the logrotate package. Its configuration file is /etc/logrotate.conf. For each package that happens to produce a log file, there is an additional configuration file under /etc/logrotate.d/. It is also easy to write your own - begin by using one of the existing files as an example. Rotation means that the log file is renamed with a .1 extension and then truncated to zero length. The service is notified by the logrotate program, sometimes with a SIGHUP. Your /var/log/ may contain a number of old log files named .2, .3, etc. The point of log file rotation is to prevent log files from growing indefinitely. From Rute-Users-Guide