How to check sys log/events log in linux

you SHOULD have to be root to look at the system logs. Looking in my /var/logs directory shows me mostly 600 modded files. The file you probably want is /var/log/messages

I found the logs in /var/log folder. Some files have extensions, other don't. Here are some of the files I see in this folder. We have firewall and IDP, the logs are directed to this system. On firewall and IDP, only IP is configured as syslog server. How do I know which ones are from firewall and which one from IDP. Also how to view them. Some files below seems to be huge. Is .gz zip file extension? Is vi editor only way to view them or any other options? I am new to linux. Your help will be appreciated.

extlog   3005821604
extlog.1.gz   271880489
exlog.2.gz    238664375
messages   3005836775
messages.1.gz   271895532
messages.2.gz   238682314

Thanks, Leo

extlog is the recent log for the firewall and messages is the recent log for your machine.
the .1.gz and .2.gz are the result of logrotate script that package any log every week.

vi is an option to see it, you can use too emacs or if you have X installed you can use another texteditor like gedit or kedit

My uncompressed file is about 3.4 gig, and opening it in vi editor would take a lot of processing. I tried to move the file to windows, but when I unzipped it with winzip, and tried to open it in notepad and word, it would just show a one line garbage. Do you know how can I open it in readable form.

Thanks,

with the split command you can create a files more redeables than 3 gb. for example 300 Mb
http://webtools.live2support.com/linux/split.php