Mysql Backup Connection in PHP

[Locu]

I notice with PHP if a connection cannot be established to a mysql
server with mysql_connect() PHP will timeout and never try the backup
server. In this example:

$db = mysql_connect('db1.local.net', 'username', 'password');
if (!$db) {
$db = mysql_connect('db2.local.net', 'username', 'password');
}

This works great and connects to the 2nd database if the 1st one
rejects the connection completely; however, if the 1st db is under high
load and doesn't respond for 10+ seconds it never jumps to the 2nd one.
Curious if there's a better way to accomplish this. If the 1st db
doesn't respond in 1 second max I'd like to hop to the 2nd one.

Does the newer mysqli_connect handle this better, anyone know?

[fletch]

Don't know about mysqli_connect() but you could use fsockopen() and set
a short timeout, close the connection and then reconnect with
mysql_connect();

I would hope there was a tidier solution that this though. Perhaps load
balancing on the backup server, in relation to how much it can handle?

[Locu]

Another issue I'm trying to overcome is locking issues. We do
dual-master replication, and in the event a table is locked on db1, it
should still be readable on db2. It would be great to have a way to
timeout a connection if no response rcv'd in say.. 2 seconds for it to
kick to the 2nd server.