Ubuntu 12.04.1 Installation problems (boot-up/partition)

Question

After Windows cleanup, defrag and creating a partition of unallocated free space from c: drive; started out with 3 partitions:

• Windows Storage 200MB
• Windows OS 162GB
• Windows Recovery 13GB
• with about 131GB unallocated free space

Inside of Ubuntu 12.04.1 Installer (32-bit, though installed on a 64-bit system) – booted through a USB stick:

• Deleted Windows Recovery partition to free up an extra partition; unallocated free space up to about 145GB
• Added partition of 30GB for Ubuntu ext 4 / mount
• Added partition of 8GB for Linux swap
• Added remainder (~107 GB) into final partition for storage at /home mount (started out with FAT32)

Tried to continue installation – DENIED because:

The file system type FAT32 cannot be mounted on /home, because it is not a fully-functional Unix file system. Please choose a different file system, such as ext2.

Thus, I switched to ext4 for the /home mount storage partition, hoping that I could change it later with Gparted or find some other work-around to enable me to share my folders (docs, music, photos, etc.) between Windows 7 and Ubuntu 12.04.1.

The installation proceeded, yet never asked which partition I wanted to choose to place Ubuntu within. Upon conclusion of install, it auto-rebooted only to have the system freeze up. I forced shut down and manually booted. Instead of giving me the Windows 7/Ubuntu option, it first booted directly into Ubuntu.

Next, I loaded and ran Boot Repair, which informed me that the problem was now resolved. What that provided (after reboot) was the purple GRUB screen with a Ubuntu boot option at the top and a Windows 7 boot option several options down. This does work, but it is not the setup that I have seen (when I test ran Ubuntu through Wubi) that showed a one or other choice (Ubuntu or Windows) in a more attractive 2-option layout screen (prior to the GRUB screen).

Questions:

• How do I know if Ubuntu was installed in the appropriate directory?
• Is it installed in sda3?
• Also, as it appears (to me anyway), it looks as though my sda4 (that was to be my storage /home mount partition) is now an extended partition with the swap (in sda5) and the /home mount partition for file storage/sharing (in sda6). Is this correct for my needs?

Essentially, I would like:

1. The boot option to be in the concise choice (b/w) screen PRIOR to loading through GRUB (is it possible to edit GRUB to achieve this objective?), and
2. My partition structure to be correct to enable a work-around for file sharing (Windows/Ubuntu) through a common storage partition (if incorrect for my needs, is it possible to edit within Gparted?).

Listed below please find my fdisk and parted terminal information:

john@john-HP-G71-Notebook-PC:~$ sudo fdisk -l
[sudo] password for john: 

Disk /dev/sda: 320.1 GB, 320072933376 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 38913 cylinders, total 625142448 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: 0x8d769ec6

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1   *        2048      409599      203776    7  HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sda2          409600   341301247   170445824    7  HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sda3       341301248   399894527    29296640   83  Linux
/dev/sda4       399896574   625141759   112622593    5  Extended
/dev/sda5       399896576   415518719     7811072   82  Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda6       415520768   625141759   104810496   83  Linux

john@john-HP-G71-Notebook-PC:~$ sudo parted -l
Model: ATA Hitachi HTS72323 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 320GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: msdos

Number  Start   End    Size    Type      File system     Flags
 1      1049kB  210MB  209MB   primary   ntfs            boot
 2      210MB   175GB  175GB   primary   ntfs
 3      175GB   205GB  30.0GB  primary   ext4
 4      205GB   320GB  115GB   extended
 5      205GB   213GB  7999MB  logical   linux-swap(v1)
 6      213GB   320GB  107GB   logical   ext4

Answer 1

Everything looks fine.

• Q: How do I know if Ubuntu was installed in the appropriate directory?

When you selected / as the mount point for sda3 Ubuntu installation knew that's where it should put the system files for Ubuntu.

• Q: Is it installed in sda3?

So yes, Ubuntu is installed in sda3.

• Q: Also, as it appears (to me anyway), it looks as though my sda4 (that was to be my storage /home mount partition) is now an extended partition with the swap (in sda5) and the /home mount partition for file storage/sharing (in sda6). Is this correct for my needs?

There can be only 4 primary partitions. That includes the extended partition sda4 which contains the logical partitions sda5 (swap) and sda6 (/home). This is as it should be. There is no way to make 5 primary partitions.

GRUB vs Windows Bootloader

The WUBI install uses Windows bootloader. This is the simple one you had seen before. A full install, as you have just completed uses GRUB. There are reasons for these choices that I don't fully understand. However, I know trying to replace one with the other is a bad idea. So you may have to get used to the GRUB. Yes you can customize the GRUB menu, but that is another question.

File Sharing and common storage

Out of the box, Windows does not recognize ext4 partition, but Ubuntu recognizes ntfs. So when you boot Windows you won't have access to the Ubuntu /home.

When you boot Ubuntu you will have access to your Windows partition. However, Ubuntu uses a different system for storing file and folder ownership and permissions information (That's why /home cannot be in NTFS or FAT32). So when you put a file of Ubuntu origin in the NTFS partition some of the ownership and permission information may be lost. This may be fine for music, and photos at home, but is a potential problem for sensitive documents and personal configuration files.

Search this site for specific suggestions on how to share files between Windows and Ubuntu on the same machine. Look at Windows Ubuntu dual boot - Share files between OS for how to keep documents and files in NTFS partition and link them to folders in Ubuntu.

Hope this helps.