diff --git a/changes/bug11805 b/changes/bug11805
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000..02a5538948869c5e31092bce1e133b96bcfe5aa8
--- /dev/null
+++ b/changes/bug11805
@@ -0,0 +1,5 @@
+  o Minor bugfixes:
+    - Correctly detect the total available system memory. We tried to do this
+      in 0.2.5.4-alpha, but the code was set up to always return an error
+      value, even on success.
+      Fixes bug 11805; bugfix on 0.2.5.4-alpha. 
diff --git a/src/common/compat.c b/src/common/compat.c
index 974f697e34795b7c28bea4212bb1df785b22f0e6..7a444df1069f8ac22e35c795a2193aee81341d43 100644
--- a/src/common/compat.c
+++ b/src/common/compat.c
@@ -3453,6 +3453,6 @@ get_total_system_memory(size_t *mem_out)
 
   *mem_out = mem_cached = (size_t) m;
 
-  return -1;
+  return 0;
 }