Apparently, one cannot use associative arrays in order to compose the record to be written to the dbf file. The following code will not work and will raise an unexpected error:
<?php
$record = array("ID" => 10, "VALUE" => 'Hello');
dbase_add_record($dbid, $record);
?>
Instead:
<?php
$record = array(0 => 10, 1 => 'Hello');
dbase_add_record($dbid, $record);
?>