move unallocated hd space to sda8 inside extended partition sda4
 

I am running multiboot 64 bit system with Win 7 and three linux partitions.

I am attaching a screen shot of my partitions.

sda8 is out of room so I need to increase its size.

I booted into gparted from a cd and meant to increase the extended partition by two GB but ended up creating a new logical partition of 12 gb but I did manage to get it inside the extended partition sda4. Now how do I get it the sda8 partition?

Do I have to format it to ext4 and increase the size of sda11 and continually work it up to sda8? Then how to I get it into sda8 since it is formatted as ext3?

Probably simpler than I am trying to make it.

Thanks for any help.

Since partitions 9, 10, and 11 are all types that gparted supports, you just need to move each one toward the end of the extended partition, then extend sda8 into the vacated space. Start with partition 11 and just drag it to the right, then partitions 10 and 9 in turn. Then drag the end of partition 8 to the right to fill the space. You can set up all those operations, then just click the "apply" button once and let the machine do the work. You might have to reinstall the boot loader for Sparky afterward, depending on how it was set up. gparted doesn't always get that part right.

CAUTION: Moving and extending partitions (moving, especially) is inherently a risky operation. You really should have backups of all of the affected partitions before doing any of this.

I tried doing everything at once and got an error. Then I tried just moving sda11 and applying and still got the error. Gparted thinks sda11 is in use. Do I need a 64 bit gparted?

The error is inside the folder 'e2fsck -f -y -v /dev/sda11'

I am using gparted 0.13.1 and the latest i586 iso is 0.21.0-1.

Or should I get the amd64 iso?

edit
tried a newer amd64 version and got the same error. How do edit what gparted is trying to do?

I didn't realize you were trying to do that from a running system. You will have to boot from separate media, either a gparted live CD or a package like SystemRescueCd that includes gparted. Either of those can be loaded to a USB flash drive or burned to a CD. You can't make changes to partitions with filesystems that are currently mounted.

Sorry about that.

The communication problem is mine. I probably never said that I was using a gparted cd. After I downloaded the amd64 iso, I intalled it on a usb and used it on the 64 bit machine. It gave me the exact same error. For some reason it thinks sda11 is in use, which it is not since I booted from a usb one time and a cd another and was given the same error message.

Is this the command that the gui is carrying out? 'e2fsck -f -y -v /dev/sda11'

I have never tried manipulating partitions from the command line but I am wondering if one of the parameters in the command might be causing the error.

edit
I looked at the command e2fsck and none of the parameters seemed to indicate why sda11 is thought to be in use.

I have no idea why gparted would think that sda11 was in use. From the padlock symbols in the screenshot you posted, I would presume that image, at least, was made from the running "Sparky" system.
I set up a 500GB disk image with partitions like you have, and had no problem at all with gparted. Perhaps it has something to do with the way you mysteriously got that extra 12GiB into the extended partition.

Post the output from "fdisk -lu /dev/sda" so that I can see if anything looks suspicious.

As for that "e2fsck -f -y -v /dev/sda11", gparted would run something like that (without the "-y" option, I sincerely hope) to check the filesystem before and after moving it, but that's not what does the actual move.

fdisk -lu /dev/sda

Disk /dev/sda: 500.1 GB, 500107862016 bytes, 976773168 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0xb9715f43

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 63 4176899 2088418+ 7 HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sda2 4176900 517035072 256429086+ 7 HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sda3 517036032 600922111 41943040 7 HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sda4 600924158 833503231 116289537 5 Extended
/dev/sda5 600924160 617701375 8388608 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda6 617703424 638674943 10485760 83 Linux
/dev/sda7 638676992 722556927 41939968 83 Linux
/dev/sda8 722558976 743530495 10485760 83 Linux
/dev/sda9 * 743532544 764504063 10485760 83 Linux
/dev/sda10 764506112 806447103 20970496 83 Linux
/dev/sda11 806449152 827420671 10485760 83 Linux

I don't see anything amiss there. When you are running gparted from the CD or USB stick, do any of those padlock icons show up? If so, where? And, what versions of gparted have you tried? That padlock icon looks different from the ones in any of the versions I've tried.

I haven't noticed any padlock icons that I remember. Here are the versions that I have used 0.13.1 an older cd and the latest i586 iso is 0.21.0-1 I used from a usb.

I think I will run it again just to see if I notice any padlock icons and if I get the same error message.

edit
I ran the latest version using the usb and nothing changed. Didn't see any padlock icons. It tried moving the unallocated space out of sda4 (extended partition) and got it all out except for 1.00 MiB. Wasn't able to get that back into the unallocated part of the hard drive.

Sounds like sda11 is broken, and gparted won't proceed until it's fixed. Try running the fsck yourself from the liveCD but without the "-y".

When I run sudo e2fsck -f -v /dev/sda11 I get the message that sda11 is in use. That can't be since I booted from a usb.

This unit is certified Microsoft refurbished that I bought just to get Windows 7. It(win 7) was already installed when I got it. I had customers that were running Win 7 and I still had XP and was running Linux most of the time. So I bought this refurbished Win 7 unit. It works fine and all I had to do was install a dvd drive and some more ram.

I have found since I have started to multiboot this unit that some distros don't see any partitions or drives when I try to install them. I have found Sparky, PCLOS, and Manjaro saw the partitions and installed them but there were many that just didn't see anything when I got to the page of the installation where I was supposed to choose which partition to install to. That is another story and I have never found the solution.

I said all the above to just give you the background on this unit.

It is a personal desktop and no one uses it but me. So, while I appreciate your efforts in trying to help me, there must be something strange about this unit that might never be discovered. I may have to delete some of the partitions and re-partition and re-install the three that I know will install. Thanks so much for your help. I am not being dismissive. I realize how hard it is to solve some computer problems thru the back and forth of the forum. I don't want you to continue to spend time on what might be a waste of time because we might not ever find the solution. Thanks

Are you booting that USB on the bare iron, i.e. by pressing whatever magic key gets you to the BIOS boot selection menu and selecting the USB drive? I ask because this is sounding like you are booting a virtual machine from a host OS that is using sda11.

No, not going into the bios to launch the USB. I either shutdown or reboot with the USB plugged into the desktop on the front. I have been into the bios before but don't normally do it unless trying to resolve some problem. My lack of knowledge makes me wary of changing something in the bios that might render my desktop un-bootable.

I would be glad to look and report back what I find if you could tell me where to look.

It might help to know just what is in /dev/sda11.