Problems with merging 2 partitions on El Capitan

The log didn't capture anything because of the reason that diskutil failed. Let's do as it asks and repair the volume individually:

diskutil repairVolume disk0s2

Then try again with:

diskutil resizeVolume disk0s2 R

Please post the output of both commands.

Last login: Mon Aug 24 21:24:36 on ttys000

Clarences-MacBook-Pro:~ Clarence$ diskutil repairVolume disk0s2

Error starting file system repair for disk0s2 Clarence's Macintosh HD: Unable to unmount volume for repair (-69673)

Clarences-MacBook-Pro:~ Clarence$ diskutil resizeVolume disk0s2 R

Resizing to full size (fit to fill)

Started partitioning on disk0s2 Clarence's Macintosh HD

Verifying the disk

Verifying file system

Using live mode

Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume

Incorrect block count for file InstallESD.dmg

(It should be 5432 instead of 1481390)

Checking catalog hierarchy

Checking extended attributes file

Volume bitmap needs minor repair for orphaned blocks

Checking volume information

Invalid volume free block count

(It should be 8277820 instead of 6801862)

File system check exit code is 8

Error: -69803: Couldn't modify partition map because file system verification failed; please verify and repair each volume individually and then try again

Clarences-MacBook-Pro:~ Clarence$

That makes sense - I should have asked you to reboot back into your USB installer and run the commands from there.

-Bash-3.2# disutil resizeVolume Usage: Diskutil resizeVolume MountPoint|DiskIdentifier|DeviceNode size [part1Format part1Name part1Size part 2Format part2Name part2Size part3Format part3Name part3Size...] Non-destructively resize a disk. You may increase or decrease its size. When decreasing size, you may optimally specify new partitions to create to fill the newly-freed space. Specify these new partitions as in the diskutil partitionDisk command. A size of zero will cause a grow fit-to-fill. Ownership of the affected disk is required. Valid sizes are floating-point numbers with a suffix of B(ytes) , S(512-byte-blocks),K(ilobytes),M(egabytes),G(igabytes),T(era bytes),P(etabytes), or (%) percentage of the total size of the whole disk. A size of "limits" will print the valid range for the current conditions of the file system and room to grow up to an immovable object(next partition). A size of "R" for the target partition will resize it to the maximum possible; "R" cannot be used for the size of new partition triples, if any. [resizeVolune is only supported on a Journaled HFS+ file system. [-bash-3.2# disk0s2R -bash: disk0s2R: command not found

It's this command you need to run from Recovery Terminal:

diskutil repairVolume disk0s2

bash-3.2# diskutil repairVolume disk0s2

Started file system repair on disk0s2 Clarence's Macintosh HD

Repairing file system

Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume

Checking extents overflow file

checking catalog file

Checking multi-linked files

Checking catalog hierarchy

Checking extended attributes file

Checking volume bitmap

Checking volume information

Volume header needs minor repair

Repairing volume

Rechecking Volume

Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume

Checking extents overflow file

checking catalog file

Checking multi-linked files

Checking catalog hierarchy

Checking extended attributes file

Checking volume bitmap

Checking volume information

Trimming unused blocks

The volume Clarence's Macintosh HD was repaired successfully

However, my disk is still only 87GB, not getting the full space of my Mac.

That was just repairing the volume in preparation for trying the resize command again (also from Recovery Terminal):

diskutil resizeVolume disk0s2 R

apparently, my thumbdrive doesnt have the space... it is 8GB. i got a 64Gb external sd card, and i would like to format it to replace the 8GB thumbdrive , but i cant format it.

I'm confused - I thought we were trying to set the "Clarence's Macintosh HD" partition on your internal SSD back to nearly 128GB?

If the diskutil resizeVolume disk0s2 R command referenced your 8GB thumbdrive, then remove the thumbdrive, boot back into Recovery Mode, and try again.

alright, ill show you

-Bash-3.2# disutil resizeVolume disk0s2 R

Resizing to full size( fit to fill)

Started partitioning on disk0s2 Clarence's Macintosh HD

Verifying the disk

Verifying file system

Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume

Checking extents overflow file

checking catalog file

Checking multi-linked files

Checking catalog hierarchy

Checking extended attributes file

Checking volume bitmap

Checking volume information

The volume Clarence's Macintosh HD appears to be OK

FIle system exit code is 0

Resizing

Error: -69742: The requested size change for the target disk or a related disk is too small; please try a different disk or partition, or make a larger change

can i use this method then? 1. restore my Mac to factory settings 2. restore from backup

No, that won't work - you have to boot into your Mac from a drive that is not the one with the partitions that you can't merge. Creating a USB installer is the best for that - you only need a USB of 8GB to make one.

yeah, i was using a 8GB thumbdrive.. but there was that error which i posted above.

Please try again using this guide I posted for making an El Capitan GM USB installer - I know that it works: https://forums.developer.apple.com/thread/17266