Sometimes, we need to clear the contents of a log file or text file which is continuously increasing in size to save the space on the hard disk. In Linux, we can easily do it and there are many commands to clear the content of the file to make the file empty. The most used command in Linux systems to clear the content of a file is cat /dev/null > filename.log

If we want to clear the content of log file /var/log/messages then we have to use the below command

# cat /dev/null > /var/log/messages

 

Clear the Contents of a File in Windows

In Window, we can clear the content of a text file or log file using the cat command and it really works

• Search the Command Prompt and Run as administrator.
• First, check the size of the file named logFile.log, here it is around 15 MB.

  C:\windows\system32>dir F:\logFile.log
   Volume in drive F is New Volume
   Volume Serial Number is 3446-545B
  
   Directory of F:\
  
  16-07-2018  14:52        15,803,465 logFile.log
                 1 File(s)     15,803,465 bytes
                 0 Dir(s)  71,806,472,192 bytes free</pre?

 

• Run the command cat /dev/null > logFile.log to clear the contents of the file. It will give you an error but the contents of the file will be removed which we will verify in the next step.

  C:\windows\system32>cat /dev/null > F:\logFile.log
  'cat' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
  operable program or batch file.

• Verify the size of the logFile.log file after clearing the contents, it becomes 0 bytes.

  C:\windows\system32>dir F:\logFile.log
   Volume in drive F is New Volume
   Volume Serial Number is 3446-545B
  
   Directory of F:\
  
  12-08-2020  16:57                 0 logFile.log
                 1 File(s)              0 bytes
                 0 Dir(s)  71,822,176,256 bytes free
  

 

Note: I have done this activity on Microsoft Windows 10.

Last Updated: August 19, 2020