1

My Ubuntu box restarted without warning, what log files do I need to examine? Specifically,, (1) which log files will tell me what forced a sudden restart? And (2) where do I find them?

Update: Following waltinator's answer I ran sudo journalctl -b -1 -e and spotted:

 smartd[1310]: Device: /dev/sda [SAT], SMART Usage Attribute: 194 Temperature_Celsius changed from 108 to 109

I suspect I have a thermal problem.

Also did this:

  [  me  ]:/var/log$ ls -al /var/crash
  total 4936
  drwxrwsrwt  2 root     whoopsie    4096 Jul 30 07:40 .
  drwxr-xr-x 16 root     root        4096 Jun  5  2017 ..
  -rw-r-----  1 [  me  ] whoopsie 4537678 Jul 24 12:50 _usr_bin_simple-scan.1000.crash
  -rw-r--r--  1 [  me  ] whoopsie       0 Jul 24 10:34 _usr_bin_simple-scan.1000.upload
  -rw-------  1 whoopsie whoopsie      37 Jul 24 10:34 _usr_bin_simple-scan.1000.uploaded
  -rw-r-----  1 root     whoopsie  498295 Jul 24 10:57 _usr_sbin_ippusbxd.0.crash
  -rw-r--r--  1 root     whoopsie       0 Jul 24 10:53 _usr_sbin_ippusbxd.0.upload
  -rw-------  1 whoopsie whoopsie      37 Jul 24 10:53 _usr_sbin_ippusbxd.0.uploaded
Matthew Brown aka Lord Matt
  • 994
  • 4
  • 16
  • 39
  • Which version of Ubuntu? – waltinator Jul 29 '21 at 20:19
  • 1
    Check `ls -al /var/crash` for crash logs... if there's output, edit that into your question. Next do `more /var/log/syslog` and look around the time when the restart occurred, and see what happened just before that. Do you have any temperature monitoring utilities installed? What version Ubuntu? – heynnema Jul 29 '21 at 20:49
  • Install gnome-extension `freon` or `vitals` to get a better idea about your temps. – heynnema Aug 01 '21 at 23:29
  • See if https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ippusbxd/+bug/1877095 applies to your situation. – heynnema Aug 01 '21 at 23:33
  • Status please... – heynnema Aug 04 '21 at 00:07
  • @heynnema I had a freeze up just today and my thermals looked okay (I was displaying the graphics card at the time on the menu bar). It seems to always happen while viewing YouTube videos on Chrome but that could be a coincidence. – Matthew Brown aka Lord Matt Aug 04 '21 at 01:10
  • 1
    Does it occur when you print or scan? Try using Firefox to view YouTube videos and see if you have the same problem. Report back. – heynnema Aug 04 '21 at 03:37

1 Answers1

2

After a "sudden shutdown", aka "system crash", and reboot, the terminal command sudo journalctl -b -1 -e will show you the end of the previous boot's log's. If there is no hint there, suspect power/ overheating.

Read man journalctl to see how to extract information from the logs.

You can find how I make use of journalctl easier at https://askubuntu.com/users/25618/waltinator.

waltinator
  • 35,099
  • 19
  • 57
  • 93