Matrix 2 of 5 — format provenance and usability
=======================================================================

This file records the engineering provenance and redistribution boundary for
the Matrix 2 of 5 format implemented by Sythos Barcode Universal.

It is an engineering inventory, not legal advice. Patent, copyright and
trademark conclusions still need independent review for the jurisdiction and
the intended product. Items marked [TO VERIFY] remain open questions.


FORMAT AND IMPLEMENTATION BASIS
-------------------------------

Matrix 2 of 5 is a numeric-only symbology from the same 1968-1972 "2 of 5"
family already implemented in this SDK (Industrial, IATA, Standard, and the
already-shipped Data Logic 2 of 5), developed in the 1970s by Nieaf Co. in
the Netherlands for warehouse sorting, photo finishing and airline ticket
marking. It shares the exact width-modulated digit grammar already
implemented for Data Logic 2 of 5 (both bars and spaces carry width
information), combined with its own, longer guard frame distinct from Data
Logic's short IATA-style one.

The run-width descriptions are represented as original Sythos data and
expanded algorithmically for the selected wide-bar ratio; the shared digit
table is reused from the existing Data Logic implementation rather than
duplicated. The reader validates the full start/data/stop structure,
quiet-zone boundary and optional check digit before returning a value; the
2:1 wide:narrow ratio is intentionally rejected by both the writer and
reader, for the same reversed-image collision reason already documented for
Data Logic 2 of 5 (verified by exhaustive round-trip testing during
implementation, since both formats share the same digit table). No
third-party source code, lookup table or binary asset is copied into this
repository.

The runtime is original Sythos TypeScript with generated JavaScript output
and is distributed under the MIT License. The format name is descriptive
and does not imply certification by any organisation.


PATENT AND TRADEMARK REVIEW
---------------------------

As with the rest of the Code 25 family, historical patent families,
jurisdiction-specific licensing statements and current registrations for
the "Matrix 2 of 5" name have not been independently cleared here.
[TO VERIFY] This project makes no unconditional patent-free, public-domain
or trademark-clearance claim.


INDEPENDENT VALIDATION BOUNDARY
--------------------------------

Zint (libzint, BSD-3-Clause) was used only as a local, independent black-box
oracle to cross-check the guard-frame structure against a published
open-source implementation before this SDK's own original data structures
were written (the shared digit table was already cross-checked the same way
for Data Logic 2 of 5). Its source, tables and runtime are not copied into
or shipped by this SDK, and it is not a runtime dependency. The comparison
is an engineering check, not a legal opinion or a conformance certificate.


CONCLUSION
----------

The original Sythos Matrix 2 of 5 implementation is MIT-licensed. If a
rights holder or user identifies a conflicting notice about the available
material, please open a GitHub issue with the reference so it can be
reviewed and recorded.