Did You Know the /var/log Folder in Linux is Telling a Story?

Every action you take when you work on your computer or device is recorded in its logs. These logs tell a story to those who want to read it, and come in very handy in case a system is attacked.

- Anisha Ghosh and Aditya Mitra

Sumerian writings and Egyptian hieroglyphs have one thing in common — both use pictorial signs to represent events, thoughts, or abstract ideas. The Sumerian language is said to be the oldest written language in existence, first attested about 3100 BCE in Southern Mesopotamia (currently Iraq). Hieroglyphs were the writing system used by ancient Egyptians. They date back to a similar time period. But what is so special about them? Well, they represent the time when man decided to keep written records for all the events taking place. Records prior to that were kept verbally, passed on from generation to generation in the form of songs or stories. However, note that keeping a record of events has always been important in the history of mankind.

Now, let us go to the history of record-keeping in computers and computing.

In the 1960s, MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), AT&T Bell Labs and GE (General Electric) jointly developed an experimental time-sharing operating system called Multics for the GE-645 mainframe. This was the predecessor to the UNIX operating system.