For the past few day I have been getting SPAM emails about a web browser call xAurora saying its a 100% Sri Lankan made and using Win32 Assembly, after using this some how I got to know this is just a skin or a so call UI for the Internet Explore HTML Engine.
so after some investigations and doing some discussion on SBU about this we came a cross that this is not even made in Sri Lanka but this is totally some thing else and they are just faking it saying its Sri Lankan.
Few points we came up with
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1. xAurora is Windows Internet Explore component based and it use Internet Explore HTML Engine.
2. With out Internet Explore components you cant run xAuroara on Linux using wine even tho they claim it on there web site saying it runs on Linux with wine.
3. xAurora is simply a copy of Maxthon (myIE2)
4. ICTA Sri Lanka never funded xAurora in anyway.
xAuroa is Windows Internet Explore component based and it use Internet Explore HTML Engine.
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IE (Internet Explore) HTML Engine is the heart of IE and the Windows OS, we found when xAurora cant find a web page or any error, it simply show the IE error pages as its use the IE HTML Engine
above shows the page not found error “Internet Explorer cannot display the webpage” on xAurora its the same error you see in IE.
above you see xaurora.exe is dependent on MSHTML.DLL, MSHTML.DLL is the IE HTML Engine.
With out Internet Explore components you cant run xAuroara on Linux using Wine even tho they claim it on there web site.
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There web site showing that xAuroa runes on Linux (any Unix System) on wine.
but below it shows that it fail to run on Linux with wine with out the IE HTML Engine proving xAuroa does use IE HTML engine.
Tested on Kubuntu and Linux Mint (Malinthe)
xAurora is simply a copy of Maxthon (myIE2)
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here we are simply saying xAuroa is a 100% copy of Maxthon former myIE2 (Internet Explore clone) (old myIE2 source can be downloaded from here)
* This shows the maxthon “licence.txt” and xAurora “licence.txt” are 90% smiler to each other proving they have edited the original maxthon licence.txt file.
* maxthon and xAurora has identical file names and folders, both folder structures are the same. (Download Maxthon)
* maxthon and xAurora SDK are the same. 100% (Download SDK’s for xAurora & Maxthon)
* xAurora and Maxthon SDK’s has the same Data Flow diagrams.
(xAurora SDK’s located at DataFlowMap-HIGHRES\image002.bmp and maxthon SDK’s located in the images\image002.bmp)
(first is the xAurora and secound one is Maxthon)
* xAurora and Maxthon API DLL’s xaurora.dll and maxzlib.dll are the same, it shows xAurora has just renamed the Maxthons DLL.
ICTA Sri Lanka never funded xAurora in anyway.
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The email that get forwarded around with a PowerPoint presentation says on slide 12, “xAurora web browser is now funded by ICTA - Sri Lanka, ICTA is enabling this browser on their NANASALA @ e-Sri LANKA Project” ( download it from here)
but when we spoke to Mr. Wasantha Deshapriya at ICTA Sri Lanka, he told us that ICTA Sri Lanka never funded xAurora in anyway.
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The discussion about the matter at SBU can be found here (Mostly in Sinhala)
xAurora වෙබ් Web Site and there Blog
Maxthon Web Site and there Forum.
====== UPDATES =========
Email Sent by Sameera De Alvis and Our Reply.
xAuroa and Maxthon GUI comparison.
=====================
Lastly what i have to say is, xAuroa is a fake, and its a stolen code from Maxthon, and this is really disporting as this kind a people are putting innocent people in the dark
My Thanks to Prasan Hettiarachi, Malinthe Samarakon, Wasantha Deshapriya and Harshana Weerasinghe
Here’s the Speed test done, IE, Maxthon, xAuroa and Firefox, and Firefox is the fastest.
Good work mate..ill be featuring ur article on my site also..these fakers should be bashed to death…now these guys are claiming xAurora is accepted as the default browser for Windows 7 lmao what a joke but normal ppl might think this is true. im really ashamed of this kinda things our IT crowd doing Dr. Sameera de Alwis ur a shame to all the IT professionals around the globe.
This is how he has created xAurora
(1)Disassemble Maxthon.exe and get the Dissassembly listing. (Since some versions are packed using UPX you may need an unpacker too).
- Thats why he claims written in Assembly
(2) Do string modifications ie. replace Maxthon with xAurora, MyIE2 with MyWEB etc.. and change refereance to Maxthon DLL to xAurora.dll
-See all these word pairs are of same length. People who knows revers engineering knows why it is -
(3)Assemble it again with MS Macro Assembler
-This is where Dr Sameera should be admired. Since most disassembled code cannot be assembled straight away.
(4)Use anti debugging tools to encrpt the generated file. And use PECompact 2.x to pack it
-This is why normal debuggers cannot debug it
(5)Edit the License text wile much like step 2
-No comments
(6)Now get HEX editor and Edit strings in Maxthon DLL (same as step 2). ANd rename it to xAurora.dll
-Shame
(7)Bundle every thing and publish.
(8)Get Maxthon SDK and give it away as xAurora SDK
(9)Make different versions with already developed Maxthon skins and plugins.
(10) Finally try to fool ICTA and get some funding for hacking
I dont see much difference between Sakvithi Sir and Dr(?) Sameera.
Skavithi - Fooled Mr Edvin and steal mony from people promising high ROI.
Sameera - Trying to Fool ICTA and get government funding (ie steal money from people) promising hacked browser.
Shame on Sri Lankan IT Professionals….
More to this
Maxthon developers have partnered with Microsoft in 2006 ( “In January 2006, Maxthon developers partnered with Microsoft in its booth at the Consumer Electronics Show.” - Wikipedia), So Dr(?) Sameera thinks that MS will take on Maxthon and when people see it on futer Windows version he can fool local community to think that his browser has got absorbed to windows.
-Nice Dream
I just read the Reply the guy has sent you, Kalinga he thinks we are a bunch of idiots, holy hell ofcource all windows applications use windows API to function properly lmao (all those DLL’s he pointed are Windows API) that was one of the silliest arguments of all times, the thing hes trying to hide is hes cracked Maxthon and Maxthon uses the IE HTML rendering engine so Inherently this xAurora is also bound to the IE HTML rendering engine, idiot is slipping away from your point, and he never mentions that Firefox uses Gecko Engine to do HTML rendering, this guy is a Total cheat and a very cheap one at that.
Just to point out how silly his arguments about Firefoxes Windows API usage. this was one of his arguments..
“11. COMDLG32.DLL — comdlg32.dll is a module that contains Common
dialog boxes used by Windows applications, such as the standard Open
File
form.
(Firefox programmers can not write a SIMPLE DIALOG BOX ALSO. Shame on
you all….)”
All u have to do to make him a sad puppy is look at the open file dialog box of xAurora it uses the same COMDLG32.DLL based open file dialog box lmfao
look at this pic: http:\\www.thezeroone.com\images\aurora.jpg
I knew these buggers were lying from the beginning!!!
Even that skin is VERY badly done. Not usable at all
xAurora exe is unpacked, and what we found ?
strings of Maxthon he has fail to edit or cant remove
Thanks @Anonymouse
here’s the information with more details
http://kalingasblog.com/xaurora/xAurora2008_exe_hack.htm
again proving xAuroa is just a simple hacked edition of Maxthon, nothing Sri Lankan, just a hacked software.
its seem the “follower” of Sameera De Alwis or him self, is trying to take this off topic by putting irrelevant comments on the blog, trying to make this a confusing for normal users when there are to many non related comments on this blog.
they still fail to challenge our points and facts as they are true and cant be broken.
they are just saying “don’t bad mouth Sameera De Alwis” who is the one who calm he made xAurora ?
so u want to defend him, prove our findings are wrong, and if you want to prove his a Dr. give us his University of his PhD and the year.
once more xAurora is simple a edited hacked version of Maxthon, plane and simple, rather then talking nonsense, talk with facts.
from comment 62
http://sinhala.kalingasblog.com/2008/10/20/xaurora-browser/#comment-987
“keep this at an intellectual level, don’t go low as Sameera De Alwis did in his email, as he has no intellectual skills to keep an intelligent conversion rather then trashing people like you all are doing right now, so can see you cant even call him a PhD (Doctor of Philosophy)
since you guys are his followers, I don’t blame you for going low like this, you have to follow your leader right, since you have no analytical skills to answer our questions.
talk to point of each evidence we have given. “
its says that xAurora is running Kernel Mode but we all know that a single exe cant run on Kernel mode
slide 10 of xAurora PowerPoint presentation says
“This is the only Web Browser that runs @ CPU RING-0 (Kernel Mode) in the world. (Lowest Level)”
so here’s proving that xAuroa/Maxthon don’t run on Kernel Mode 0
http://kalingasblog.com/xaurora/Is_xAurora_running%20_in%20_Kernel_mode.htm
Guys,
Look at the Dr.’s (claimed)credentials, he is security expert and RE expert. It is an obvious evident from his background that he has done nice RE job. Other thing is anyone who has more than 5-6 years of experience knows size of a browser project and reality of doing the same with Assembly. Today even Toyota, Boeing, or Heidelberg does not do assembly for even for their Real-Time systems.(uses At least C/C++)
Challenge him to change the layouts of Dialogs and release a version, then I a little believe him.
Challenge him to change his DLL names and release a version; specifically ask him to NOT to use arbitrary number of letters in his DLL names.(Not the exact same number of letters as the Chinese browser.)
At last I feel so sorry about SLankans for RE anything from Chinese, as Chinese are the best for this task.
Dr. does not have the idea about the complexity of Parser and Rendering Engine. I would develop a HTML parser with a single day effort, but not the latter, which I cannot imagine how much work is required.
Finally, I must suggest these Dr. to develop a cross flatform tools, such as Trolltech QT, which he could contribute the National Economy greatly, if he is good in implementing such complex idea.
Bless you.
Wireman.
@Wireman
First thing : don’t Admire him, he didn’t do a nice RE job, its the sloppiest I have ever seen, and secondly don’t call him a DR. he don’t deserve do be called like that, in fact I’m not sure he has any of those credentials.
There is no use telling him to change the GUI of the browser mate, he can still change it visually using Resource Hacker, I Strongly believe this is the software he used for this little joke of his. I was baffled by his claims also, a HTML layout engine is like a holy grail of web browsing, it takes years to perfect one (actually none of the existing ones are perfect because they cant pass the ACID 3 test). there are about 5 Layout engines in the world that’s worth taking a note. Gecko, Presto, Trident, WebKit, KHTML, and Trident engine is the worst one among the bunch (AKA IE Layout engine), and that’s what Maxthon rippoff xaurora is using and hes claiming its the best browser in the world, what a joke, all I can say is people like this should be send to jail for at least 10 years.
Here’s the update,
Maxthon has spoken and here’s there reply
“We have never given them rights to modify/re-distribute Maxthon. We are preparing some legal action. Meanwhile I want to thank all you guys input and effort to protect Maxthon. The community is the true treasure of Maxthon.
Thanks”
http://forum.maxthon.com/viewthread.php?tid=74416
here after if you need to defend xAurora, take it up with Maxthon
@Kalinga
great!! and about time, this has gone too far, now lets sit back and enjoy the show.
Ok guys this matter has been forward to Maxthon and on there forum the discussion continues
http://forum.maxthon.com/viewthread.php?tid=74416
your welcome to comment your views there, i’m closing comments here.
how ever Maxthon has confirms xAurora is in fact a hacked version of Maxthon
the Maxthon senior developer (bloodchen) him self says
“We have never given them rights to modify/re-distribute Maxthon. We are preparing some legal action. Meanwhile I want to thank all you guys input and effort to protect Maxthon. The community is the true treasure of Maxthon.”
and
“After more investigation, we are pretty sure it’s a hacked version of Maxthon 1.x . Who is more familiar with Maxthon than us ?
For xaurora guys, we respect Sri Lanka people as we respect people from all countries. What you do will not bring glory to your country. If you love Maxthon and want to promote Maxthon, please show your respect. Hacking and changing Maxthon’s brand/ownership are definitely offending. If you guys can bravely admit your mistake and promise not to do it again, in public. we can consider to resolve it peacefully.”
It is a famous fact that Sri Lankans are innovative, hardworking and (at least) several steps above the other Asian developers; Sri Lankans have earned a good reputation on good work ethics in all over the world too.
Things like what Dr. did, make a huge damage to such established images. I suggest that there should be some actions against him, from SL government bodies. CID and other IPR should take some immediate measures to repair the bad name govern on the country.
If there is a private university who is being the lecturer also should take some actions against him.
** Senior guys in the field laugh at this fellow as he has done large size SW project purely in Assembly.
No one mind if he hacks any software for fun or for showing-off.(As we all try, at the beginning of our career life). It is so serious that he claims the Intellectual rights of a hacked software. Next day he might claim MS vista as his product. Sadly, the practice of this guy anticipates that he might releases binary of a Linux clone(most of them are GPL) and will claim that he developed it (from the scratch) for that many years.
We urge authority to expose the true situation, on behalf of working professionals in abroad specially guys working in the US and Canada have substantial effect from this bad publicity.
Sri Lankans, dont allow this guy to dishonest the country anymore.
Blss you,
Wireman
Dear All,
here’s the latest update on the matter
http://www.dailymirror.lk/DM_BLOG/Sections/frmNewsDetailView.aspx?ARTID=33081
also the web site http://www.xaurora.net/ has been taken down by the owner.
this shows that truth always wins.