syslog

[Andrew Kae <aek23@cornell.edu>]

Hello everyone,

I have noticed that some of /var/log files such as syslog and lastlog
files are getting very large ~ 18-20 MB.  Is it ok to just delete them and
recreate them?

Also, I notice that, lately, whenever I boot into linux and am about to
log in,  the processor is extremely active.  When I "top", i notice that
syslogd is taking up 68% of the CPU.  Is this because files like 
/var/log/syslog file are so huge, or some other reason?

TIA