Zero free bytes incorrectly reported by initramfs

[Amos Waterland <apw@us.ibm.com>]

Hi.  The initramfs filesystem reports zero bytes free when queried with
the statfs system call, even when there are 8 GB or more free memory.

This is a problem for me because I am building software appliances that
run entirely out of an initramfs.  I need to allow the user to install
a package with apt-get (of course, the install will not be persistent
across reboots).  The apt-get source checks the f_bfree field in the
statfs struct and bails out when it sees a zero.

I have submitted a patch[1] against apt-get to just blindly plow ahead if
the filesystem type is RAMFS, but I would prefer to get some input from
this list regarding the best way to proceed.  Why does initramfs report
zero bytes free?

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[1] http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=448316