After upgrading 14.04 -> 16.04, key services are now running on systemd and using the systemd journal for logging. In 14.04, key system logs like /var/log/messages and /var/log/syslog were persistent, but after the upgrade to 16.04 there has a been a regression of sorts: Logs sent to systemd's journald are now being thrown away during reboots.
This behavior is controlled by the `Storage=` option in `/etc/systemd/journald.conf`. The default setting is `Storage=auto` which will persist logs in `/var/log/journal/`, *only if the directory already exists*. But the directory was not created as part of the 14.04 -> 16.04 upgrade, so logging was being lost for a while before I realized what was happening.
This issue could be solved by either creating /var/log/journal or changing the default Storage behavior to `Storage=persistent`, which would create the directory if need be.
After upgrading 14.04 -> 16.04, key services are now running on systemd and using the systemd journal for logging. In 14.04, key system logs like /var/log/messages and /var/log/syslog were persistent, but after the upgrade to 16.04 there has a been a regression of sorts: Logs sent to systemd's journald are now being thrown away during reboots.
This behavior is controlled by the `Storage=` option in `/etc/systemd/ journald. conf`. The default setting is `Storage=auto` which will persist logs in `/var/log/ journal/ `, *only if the directory already exists*. But the directory was not created as part of the 14.04 -> 16.04 upgrade, so logging was being lost for a while before I realized what was happening.
This issue could be solved by either creating /var/log/journal or changing the default Storage behavior to `Storage= persistent` , which would create the directory if need be.
## Related reference
* `systemd` currently compounds the issue by having ["journal --disk-usage" report memory usage as disk usage](https:/ /github. com/systemd/ systemd/ issues/ 4059), giving the impression that the disk is being used for logging when it isn't. askubuntu. com/questions/ 765315/ how-to- find-previous- boot-log- after-ubuntu- 16-04-restarts)
* [User wonders where to find logs from previous boots, unaware that the logs were thrown away](http://
## Recommended fix
Restoring persistent logging as the default is recommended.