The contents of /var/log/faillog consists of repeating "@^"

Question

When I try to view my faillog with nano /var/log/faillog the log file is filled with nothing but "@^" over and over again. (I have also tried running the command with sudo, but the contents of the file dont' change)

What would cause the faillog to fill with these 2 characters specifically?

I'm running Ubuntu Server 16.04 LTS

score 4 · Accepted Answer · answered Nov 15 '16 at 17:32

4

That's a single character ^@, which stands for ctrl-@, which is the NULL (0x00) character.

As for why they're there, /var/log/faillog is a binary file that is processed by /usr/bin/faillog See man 8 faillog for more information on using it.

answered Nov 15 '16 at 17:32

DerfK

19,313
2
35
51

Thank you @DerfK! I didn't realize that the file was not human-readable. – Native Coder Nov 15 '16 at 17:34
The other useful one is `man 5 faillog`. – Julie in Austin Sep 24 '20 at 23:27

The contents of /var/log/faillog consists of repeating "@^"

1 Answers1