Getting Partitions back from Linux

ibrowseibrowse
Posted:
in macOS edited January 2014
I installed Yellow Dog linux and now that I have Apple's X11 installed I don't even need Linux (for the hour a week I was using it anyway). But I have about 10 Gb tied up in my Linux partition that I want back for OS X. From what I know there's no way to get it back using Disk Utility without setting up all the partitions, and erasing my OS X partition. Is there a way that I can just erase every thing on the Linux partition and set it to be recognized by OS X again so I can have my two OS X partitions back, just like the good old days?

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 19
    scottscott Posts: 7,431member
    So X wont mount it huh? There's got to be a way to mount that under OS X.



    Sorry no help from me. <img src="graemlins/hmmm.gif" border="0" alt="[Hmmm]" />
  • Reply 2 of 19
    spiffsterspiffster Posts: 327member
    Go to /Applications/Utilities/Disk Copy. As long as its not your boot partition, you can reformat it to HFS+. I thought that Linux partitions could be seen by OS X. Any way you could send me a copy of your distro?
  • Reply 3 of 19
    chuckerchucker Posts: 5,089member
    No, OS X can't mount ext2. Nor reiserfs, xfs, ext3, ...
  • Reply 4 of 19
    ibrowseibrowse Posts: 1,749member
    All I need to do is set the file system back to something OS X will read.



    Spiffster; do you mean Disk Utility? It doesn't show me the option to do this, and I think it's because it's on the same disk as my boot partition. It seems as if to reformat the partition it would have to do the whole drive.
  • Reply 5 of 19
    ibrowseibrowse Posts: 1,749member
    Is there an app that you can use to format just partitions?
  • Reply 6 of 19
    pbg4 dudepbg4 dude Posts: 1,611member
    Sorry to resurrect an old thread but I'm having this problem as well and was wondering if a solution has been found.



    Disk Utility doesn't even show the non-OS X partitions on the partition page. If I can't see the partition, how can I get Disk Utility to format it?



    Any help would be greatly appreciated.
  • Reply 7 of 19
    thuh freakthuh freak Posts: 2,664member
    yes, there is a solution, but you have to be very careful with it, you need to have secure backups, and you gotta get into terminal. the program to use is called 'pdisk'. here is a link to an article on how to wipe out one or more partitions, without reformatting the whole drive. make sure you read through the article fully, before attempting anything. the disk they modified was /dev/rdisk0, if u want to modify another disk (like not-the startup one), it'll probbly be /dev/rdisk1.
  • Reply 8 of 19
    1337_5l4xx0r1337_5l4xx0r Posts: 1,558member
    Boot up from the cd. There is likely a utility called fdisk, mac-fdisk, or even pdisk will do in a pinch. Reformat the partition as type: "Apple_HFS"





    OR: Easy way, wait until 10.3 comes out, as my panther Disk Utility will show you even unreadable partitions. Simply select the offending partition, and reformat it as HFS+.



    If I were you, I'd wait for panther.
  • Reply 9 of 19
    scottscott Posts: 7,431member
    I was kind of hoping 10.3 would be able to mount these things.
  • Reply 10 of 19
    pbg4 dudepbg4 dude Posts: 1,611member
    Thanks for the replies.



    Last night I used pdisk to wipe the partitions, so they are now shown as free space. I booted from the OS X DVD and was going to use disk utility to partition the free space, but it said all existing information would be lost, so I didn't do anything (left it as free space).



    l337,



    Are you saying I can use pdisk to format this free space as hfs? This won't destroy my OS X partition? Then, could I boot into X and use Disk Utility to reformat this partition as hfs+? Does this sound right?



    Also, one more issue. Since I was using YDL, it created a partition that yaboot was on. Now that I've wiped that partition, whenever I boot my PB, I get the folder with the flasing '?' for a second, then it boots into X. Is there any way to make the X partition the 'primary' partition so I don't see this folder icon?



    Thanks for the help.
  • Reply 11 of 19
    1337_5l4xx0r1337_5l4xx0r Posts: 1,558member
    Delete your bootloader partition. Just leave it blank, it's only 800kb.



    AFA pdisk, never used it. Gentoo uses 'mac-fdisk' which I imagine is very similar. man pdisk, or type '?' after starting pdisk (if it is anything like mac-fdisk).



    Panther will likely be out in less than a month. I advise you to wait and get panther, or do what I did, and... uh... become a developer... and, um, join ADC, and install a Panther pre-release. Yeah, that's it...
  • Reply 12 of 19
    pbg4 dudepbg4 dude Posts: 1,611member
    l337,







    Actually I have an online ADC account, but they aren't nice enough to feed my betas for setting up a free account.



    I have an external 60GB HD (firewire). I think I'll use CCC to create a backup image, then wipe the HD. After that I'll reinstall OS X (again!), then try to copy everything back.



    Hopefully it'll work and I'll be back to where I am today.
  • Reply 13 of 19
    pbg4 dudepbg4 dude Posts: 1,611member
    Using pdisk (it does have the ? for help) I deleted all 3 YDL created partitions, boot, linux and linux swap. I still get the folder with the flashing '?'. It's kind of annoying.
  • Reply 14 of 19
    willywalloowillywalloo Posts: 408member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by PBG4 Dude

    Using pdisk (it does have the ? for help) I deleted all 3 YDL created partitions, boot, linux and linux swap. I still get the folder with the flashing '?'. It's kind of annoying.



    Try holding down option, and if you can get into OS X, you need to setup your boot folder with in Startup Disk, or similiar app to change PRAM config for startup. OS 9's will also do the same thing.
  • Reply 15 of 19
    ibrowseibrowse Posts: 1,749member
    I ended up just reinstalling, but there's a similar thread to this one, I believe in Genius Bar, that I started on the same topic, that has more info on using pdisk. I researched it but never ended up using it, I figured if I spent the time making all the back ups anyways, a new install would be quicker and less troublesome that fighting with pdisk and all the crazy commands.
  • Reply 16 of 19
    pbg4 dudepbg4 dude Posts: 1,611member
    You may get a good laugh out of this one!



    Due to my indiscriminate use of "sudo rm -rf *" I mananged to wipe out my "/usr/bin" directory. I thought I was in "/usr/bin/qt", but I was mistaken LOL.



    So, I backed up everything, wiped the partitions and started fresh. At least now I have 80GB that are useable to me. A good thing is the fact that this is a new 15"PB so my copy of Jaguar 10.2.7 kept me from having to do oodles of software updates.



    Now I just need to reinstall XonX and recompile Qt. Then I can compile KDE 3.1.4 over the weekend. Hopefully it'll be done before Monday (never compiled anything that big before).
  • Reply 17 of 19
    proud ibook owner 2k2proud ibook owner 2k2 Posts: 1,011member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by PBG4 Dude



    Now I just need to reinstall XonX and recompile Qt. Then I can compile KDE 3.1.4 over the weekend. Hopefully it'll be done before Monday (never compiled anything that big before).



    If you install Fink you can easily install KDE in less than 2 hours... That's what I did... but then I took it off becauase I never used it... and I got a real Linux comp.... Fink solves all dependencies (QT is needed by KDE so it'll get that as well as the KDE files) Post here again if you need help getting started with Fink.
  • Reply 18 of 19
    pbg4 dudepbg4 dude Posts: 1,611member
    Proud iBook ...,



    This ended up being the route I took. I used Fink to instal KDE. The only thing I'm worried about is that Fink only had 3.1.2 and KDE 3.1.4 is out, and the difference is supposedly security and stability updates.



    I need KDE for my programming class or I honestly wouldn't bother with it. Not that KDE isn't worthwhile (I like it so far), but I think XFree86 is just too slow compared to OS X / Aqua. At least with rootless X, I can run X and OS X stuff side by side.
  • Reply 19 of 19
    proud ibook owner 2k2proud ibook owner 2k2 Posts: 1,011member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by PBG4 Dude

    Proud iBook ...,



    This ended up being the route I took. I used Fink to instal KDE. The only thing I'm worried about is that Fink only had 3.1.2 and KDE 3.1.4 is out, and the difference is supposedly security and stability updates.



    I need KDE for my programming class or I honestly wouldn't bother with it. Not that KDE isn't worthwhile (I like it so far), but I think XFree86 is just too slow compared to OS X / Aqua. At least with rootless X, I can run X and OS X stuff side by side.



    Okay cool. I was only trying to make it easy for ya. Ya know... there's a way u can use KDE without Aqua running. If you wanna know how email me at [email protected].
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