(Old blog post, written: 2023-02-13)

(Important note: I actually broke my Mac OS with this process. This article records how I broke it. Please be very careful when operating on disks, and also how I solved it.)

Background

Recently, I needed to use an x86 architecture computer for compilation, but my main machine is ARM architecture. I tried using UTM virtual machine on my M1 computer, but the performance was quite poor. So I installed Ubuntu dual boot on another old computer (MacBook Pro 2013) and used it as a server by plugging it in on my desk. It worked quite well. I’m recording this here so I can come back and check if I forget later.

Dual boot reference: How to install Linux system on MacBook Pro? - Zhihu (Chinese article)

Although I had already backed up my home directory to the new laptop using AirDrop, I still want to share how I broke my Mac.

Initially, I only partitioned about 30GB of disk space, but when doing cross-platform compilation of Linux kernel, I found the space wasn’t enough. So I wanted to allocate some space from the Mac side. I used the method from the article above to partition, but when I used Option + Power Key to change the boot disk, I found that the Mac disk had disappeared.

At that moment, I wasn’t too panicked (after all, I had broken and reinstalled it once before). Instead, I was excited - finally had an excuse to focus properly on Linux. So I directly wiped out the Mac partition and turned the entire laptop into Linux~

Resizing Partition

Environment: Hardware: MacBook Pro 2013 Operating System: Ubuntu 20.04 x86

If you forgot to backup, you can try using Disk Drill to recover data. (But not guaranteed to recover)

The problem I encountered was that the partition couldn’t be resized. I later discovered that this is actually because we can’t modify the disk while running on the disk you want to resize (a bit convoluted - you can’t partition yourself). So we need to use a live USB boot environment to make the adjustments. Here’s the complete process.

Creating Live USB and Booting

If you don’t know how to create a live USB, you can use balenaEtcher. There are already many tutorials about it online, so I won’t go into detail here. The best part is that it can be used on Mac!

After creating it, shut down the power, plug in your USB, hold option + Power Key, select this USB (usually golden), then keep pressing Enter, and select try Ubuntu.

Using GParted for Partitioning

Enter the command sudo apt install gparted to install, then you’ll see it in your applications.

My root directory is at /dev/sda4, the 31.55GB one.

Right-click on the partition you want to move, select Resize/Move.

Now you can move freely. Move your disk to the left, so the unallocated space will be moved to the right, allowing you to expand freely.

Use df -l to check disk usage, and you can see it really got bigger (this is a screenshot from SSH connection on another laptop).

And let me record that I really wiped out the old Mac stuff. jserv said that to learn Linux well, the fastest way is to install Linux entirely. I think I have some GUTS too 😎

References: partitioning - How to merge partitions? - Ask Ubuntu ubuntu - Resizing the root partition using free space - Super User Resize or Extend a Linux Partition/Volume/Disk (Swap - Ubuntu - Gparted) - YouTube