As of GDBM version 1.8.3, GDBM's underlying open call uses non-blocking calls to flock() on systems that have flock(). As a result, calls with "rd" or "wd" locking modes will return error ("Can't be reader" or "Can't be writer") instead of waiting. Use "rl" or "wl" instead, to make PHP do its own locking external to GDBM.