Since some days, my /var/log/messages shows every 20 minutes following lines, then sometimes it stops a few days doing so and sometimes it start doing it.
Aug 8 00:12:30 mail -- MARK -- [...]
It's not a bug, it's a feature ;-)
This message is produced by syslogd and occurs when there's nothing to log at a time of 20 minutes. You can call it the *heartbeat* of your system. You see that the system is alive and if the machine crashes for instance in a power failure you can get the approximated time of the crash.
Jan
Exactly.
There is a variable in /etc/rc.config which reads
SYSLOGD_PARAMS=""
changing it to
SYSLOGD_PARAMS="-m 0"
turns off the marks completely.
Roman.
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| Roman Drahtmüller