Partitioning Situation on a MacBook

I am trying to install Meerkat on my macbook. I have already received some assistance from the Apple Forums but would like to bring the LQ community into the discussion. I have made this decision based upon the perceived likelihood that LQ users will be able to answer the 'why' questions better.

Apple Thread: http://discussions.apple.com/thread....13432&tstart=0
Ubuntu Thread: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.p...39#post9968739

Original Post: <I am on a black mac book, late 2007 I believe, and am dual booting Snow Leopard and Ubuntu 10-4. Very recently I installed rEFIt "manually". In an attempt to upgrade to Ubuntu 10.10 I encountered several errors (I suspect disk drive problems) and ultimately made no progress. In an attempt to make things simpler I decided to remove the initial Ubuntu installation and add the new one.

Under Disk Utility, I can neither remove Ubuntu's partition nor the Swap space. The error I receive says "Mediakit reports no such partition."

Though solutions to my entire problem would be nice, I am really only interested in getting a clearer picture of what exactly is going on. I want to know:
1: what is mediakit, why it is in error and how to fix it.
2: what else have I unknowingly screwed up (if anything)
3: how do I avoid this situation (mediakit issues) in the future (I have had the same issue in the past). >

question answered by ubuntu forum user pc_micheal:<Mac OS X (via mediakit) is unable to read or manipulate Linux partitions such as Ext3/4 or Linux Swap, so you won't be able to do anything via Disk Utility.

The way to do this is to boot from your Ubuntu LiveCD and use GParted (Gnome Partition Editor) to remove the Linux partitions and create the new ones when you start over.

Good luck!

Edit: If you don't want to use the Ubuntu LiveCD, you can also download an ISO of a bootable GParted CD directly from their website.>