Logging and Scheduled Restart

Question

Is there an accessible log entry that can show me/prove to me that my computer has automatically restarted as scheduled by the Energy Saver? Where would I find such a log entry if one exists?

Answer 1

The system will normally keep several different logs, of which the two best known are the system.log and the console.log. The tool to use for viewing all of them is called Console and is located inside Applications/Utilities/. The logs themselves are stored in /var/log/, /Library/Logs/ and ~/Library/Logs/.
In my system, whenever I reboot I'll see the following:
System log:
Jan 9 13:46:58 localhost kernel[0]: standard timeslicing quantum is 10000 us
Jan 9 13:46:52 localhost mDNSResponder-108.6 (Jul 19 2007 11: 33:32)[40]: starting
Jan 9 13:46:58 localhost kernel[0]: vmpagebootstrap: 254126 free pages
Jan 9 13:46:53 localhost memberd[50]: memberd starting up
Jan 9 13:46:58 localhost kernel[0]: migtable_maxdispl = 70
Jan 9 13:46:56 localhost DirectoryService[60]: Launched version 2.1 (v353.6)
Jan 9 13:46:58 localhost kernel[0]: 90 prelinked modules
Jan 9 13:46:58 localhost named[45]: starting BIND 9.3.4-P1 -f
Jan 9 13:46:58 localhost kernel[0]: Copyright (c) 1982, 1986, 1989, 1991, 1993
Jan 9 13:46:58 localhost kernel[0]: The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved.
Jan 9 13:46:58 localhost named[45]: command channel listening on 127.0.0.1#953
Jan 9 13:46:58 localhost kernel[0]: using 2621 buffer headers and 2621 cluster IO buffer headers
Jan 9 13:46:58 localhost lookupd[49]: lookupd (version 369.5) starting - Wed Jan 9 13:46:58 2008
Jan 9 13:46:58 localhost kernel[0]: IOPCCard info: Intel PCIC probe: TI 1510 rev 00
etc....
Console log:
Mac OS X Version 10.4.11 (Build 8S165)
2008-01-09 13:47:15 -0600
2008-01-09 13:47:18.689 UniversalAccess[197] LCC Scroll Enhancer loaded
2008-01-09 13:47:20.658 SystemUIServer[156] lang is:en
etc...