sz3/libcimbar

Health v2 · maintenance only

Adoption not part of the score

6426 stars · 471 forks observed · 2026-08-28

What it is AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, 2026-08-29, confidence not recorded

libcimbar is an optimized C++ implementation of the cimbar (color icon matrix) high-density 2D barcode format for air-gapped data transfer via screen-to-camera video. It encodes files up to 33MB into animated barcodes using fountain codes, zstd compression, and Reed-Solomon error correction, achieving ~850 kbit/s over a monitor and phone camera.

Use cases

• transfer files to an air-gapped computer using only a screen and camera
• encode a file into animated barcode images
• decode cimbar barcodes with a phone camera to reconstruct a file
• send data between devices without internet, bluetooth, or NFC
• build applications that read or write cimbar barcode formats

When to choose

• you need one-way data transfer into an air-gapped or network-isolated machine
• you want high-throughput optical data transfer without any radio or network channel
• you need a barcode format that tolerates out-of-order, missing, or corrupted frames

When to avoid

• you need a simple, widely-supported barcode like QR codes for small payloads
• you require real-time bidirectional communication
• your environment cannot display animated video or capture it with a camera

Facets

library · maturity active

serialization image-processing computer-vision compression error-handling computer-vision image-processing files privacy developer-tools browser wasm cpp cross-platform barcode fountain-codes air-gapped-transfer reed-solomon opencv data-transfer qr-code-alternative linux android

Member repositories

For agents

markdown · JSON · MCP: product_card(name="sz3/libcimbar")