🟡 Medium   ⏱ 5–30 min  Last verified: 19 May 2026
Affected versions: CentOS Stream 10

📖 ~1 min read

Table of contents
  1. Symptom & Impact
  2. Environment & Reproduction
  3. Root Cause Analysis
  4. Quick Triage
  5. Step-by-Step Diagnosis
  6. Solution – Primary Fix
  7. Solution – Alternative Approaches
  8. Verification & Acceptance Criteria
  9. Rollback Plan
  10. Prevention & Hardening
  11. Related Errors & Cross-Refs
  12. References & Further Reading

Symptom & Impact

Log files grow indefinitely and rotation reports errors.

Environment & Reproduction

Reported when permissions or SELinux contexts drift on log directories.

Root Cause Analysis

logrotate cannot rename or create files due to ownership or context.

Quick Triage

Run logrotate -d /etc/logrotate.conf to dry-run all configs.

Step-by-Step Diagnosis

Check /var/lib/logrotate/state and last execution timestamps.

Illustrative mockup for centos-stream-10 — logrotate_fail_diag
Diagnostic view for logrotate-rotation-failure — Illustrative mockup — Progressive Robot

Solution – Primary Fix

Fix ownership, restorecon /var/log, and adjust create/postrotate hooks.

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Illustrative mockup for centos-stream-10 — logrotate_fail_fix
Remediation steps for logrotate-rotation-failure — Illustrative mockup — Progressive Robot

Solution – Alternative Approaches

Move rotation to journald with SystemMaxUse for systemd-managed logs.

Verification & Acceptance Criteria

Logrotate executes daily and produces dated archives without errors.

Rollback Plan

Restore previous rotation config from version control if needed.

Prevention & Hardening

Forward critical logs to a central collector for redundancy.

Linked to systemd-tmpfiles and SELinux var_log_t labeling.

Related tutorial: View the step-by-step tutorial for centos-stream-10.

View all centos-stream-10 tutorials on the Tutorials Hub →

Browse all common problems & solutions on the Tutorials Hub.

References & Further Reading

logrotate manual and journald.conf reference.

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