Ubuntu install alongside current os option not available

[Ghnmik]

Hi first time posting
I need to install ubuntu 16 onto my machine for a college module but when I go to install from usb the option to install alongside windows is not available. any help would be much appreciated. I need Windows as my lecturers will only accept assignments done in MS Word Docs.
Thanks in advance

 

[captain-sensible]

well i use LibreOffice on my Slackware and save the docsuments still with the old suffix .doc (windows 2003.. something) would your lecturers know if you created it on Linux and saved it as a .doc? there used to be some odd quirks of formatting creating a .doc on linux when it was opened in Windows but i'm not sure these days they would be able to tell ?

 

[f33dm3bits]

You could also run Office on crossover Linux(2016 or O365), and otherwise you could still run a virtual machine under Linux and use Office on that.

 

[Ghnmik]

thanks for quick responses

@captain-sensible one of my classmates tried that but when the lecturer opened the document in word the formatting was all over the place.

thanks

 

[captain-sensible]

thanks for quick responses

@captain-sensible one of my classmates tried that but when the lecturer opened the document in word the formatting was all over the place.

thanks

are you sure they didn't save it as docx

 

[captain-sensible]

or .. boot from usb http://releases.ubuntu.com/16.04.6/?_ga=2.227496601.563288571.1595877236-2116241335.1589487661

 

[Ghnmik]

@captain-sensible I'm not sure ( in fact it's most probable that he did save it as docx) but just don't want to overwrite the current os I would prefer to install alongside. There are just too many things on windows that I'm just not ready to give up. ( though for the life of me I can't think of any of them right now)

 

[Alexzee]

All you would have to do to install alongside your current os is to shrink your current os's partition.

Download g-parted and use that Live to shrink your partition.
You'll probably need about 25 to 30 Gig's for your Ubuntu installation.

Once you have scaled down your partition use the unallocated space during the Ubuntu installation to create a / ext4 partition for Ubuntu and than create a 1 G partition for swap. The partition manager should be about the same as g-parted.

 

[Alexzee]

You can also go into Disk Management on your Windows os and shrink the partition that way.
OR> like I said above you can use g-parted. It's up to you.

GParted -- Live CD/USB/PXE/HD

gparted.org

 

[wizardfromoz]

G'day @Ghnmik and welcome, love that avatar

What's the size of your hard drive?

In addition to what Alex has said above:

The Ubuntu Live disk/usb contains GParted, and resizing can be done from there, before enterings the Installer, known as Ubiquity.

Ubiquity can do the rest once you have chosen Install alongside Windows.

Do you know

1. What version of Windows you are running?
2. If your computer is running under UEFI or just plain BIOS?
3. Size of Hard drive?
4. RAM available?
5. How to create a Windows Recovery disk?

Cheers

Chris Turner
wizardfromoz

 

[Ghnmik]

@Alexzee tried to shrink the drive and install it in the new free space but Ubuntu wouldn't boot from it maybe i did something wrong while installing ubuntu or shrinking the drive.

@wizardfromoz thanks and sane to you
1 windows 10 pro version 1909
2 I think that while preparing to dual boot I set it as UEFI (do you have any advice on how to check I pressed f2 to change the settings but it looked different to when I did the same for my Laptop)
3 1TB on this PC
4 8GB Ram intel i7 processor
5 learned to do it yesterday to sort out my problem on my laptop.

thanks for the help and the great questions

Declan aka Ghnmik

 

[Alexzee]

@Alexzee tried to shrink the drive and install it in the new free space but Ubuntu wouldn't boot from it maybe i did something wrong while installing ubuntu or shrinking the drive.

@wizardfromoz thanks and sane to you
1 windows 10 pro version 1909
2 I think that while preparing to dual boot I set it as UEFI (do you have any advice on how to check I pressed f2 to change the settings but it looked different to when I did the same for my Laptop)
3 1TB on this PC
4 8GB Ram intel i7 processor
5 learned to do it yesterday to sort out my problem on my laptop.

thanks for the help and the great questions

Declan aka Ghnmik

How are you trying to boot Ubuntu?

If your trying to install Ubuntu via a USB you will have to go into the BIOS and in the boot menu make USB the first choice. If using a Live CD/DVD you would make the CDROM drive the first choice in the boot menu, save the changes and reboot.