[plug] Kernel logs

[Craig Ringer]

> (1) Logging of killed processes (e.g. when kernel kills processes due
>     to resource limitations).

In the specific case of a process killed due to an out-of-memory 
condition, you should see messages like the following logged:

Out of Memory: Killed process 19992 (mozilla-bin).

(yup - runaway mozilla.... yay).

This info should be logged with the "kern" facility, priorities vary. 
Most distros log kernel messages to /var/log/messages and sometimes 
/var/log/debug or /var/log/kern.log .

> (2) Logging of Ethernet link information.

This appears to be driver-specific. I know some drivers do it. Probably 
logged as kern.info or below.

> Also: what happens to log entries that have been generated but not
> written to disk (hypothetically: they would appear in the dmesg but
> not in /var/log). 

Yes.

> Are they saved in memory so that they appear after
> reboot, or are they lost?

They are lost unless you use some form of remote logging. Unfortunately, 
syslogd may hang trying to write to a disk log file (say, if the disk 
just died) and may fail to send the log messages over the network as a 
result. I'm not aware of a solution for this that wouldn't involve 
dramatically re-working syslogd.

Craig Ringer


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