I need a way to perform "GUARANTEED NON-BLOCKING READS" in MySQL 5.0.x. Coder will need to know C code and create the appropriate patch for either the MYISAM or INNODB storage engine.

What I want is "GUARANTEED NON-BLOCKING READS". That means that a SELECT statement will never block waiting for a lock, regardless of what other activities are happening in the database.

A "GUARANTEED NON-BLOCKING READ" should be similar to how "SET TRANSACTION ISOLATION LEVEL READ UNCOMMITTED" behaves in theory.

The only difference is that "SET TRANSACTION ISOLATION LEVEL READ UNCOMMITTED" currently (5.0.67) does not work and is not GUARANTEED to unblock the reader.