Microsoft launches official Remote Desktop app for Apple's iOS

Microsoft on Thursday released an official Remote Desktop application for iPhone and iPad, giving Windows users the ability to access their Windows machine on the go.

Microsoft Remote Desktop is a free application available on the iOS App Store, compatible with both iPhone and iPad. It's a 12.6-megabyte download that requires iOS 6.0 or later.

According to Microsoft, the new application offers access to a Windows PC with RemoteFX. Features of the software include:

• Access to remote resources through the Remote Desktop Gateway
• Rich multi-touch experience with remote desktop protocol (RDP) and RemoteFX supporting Windows gestures
• Secure connection to your data and applications with breakthrough Network Layer Authentication (NLA) technology
• Simple management of all remote connections from the connection center
• High quality video and sound streaming with improved compression and bandwidth usage
• Easy connection to external monitors or projectors for presentations

Word of Microsoft's new Remote Desktop apps for both iOS and OS X was made by the company last week. New versions are also said to be coming to Android, Windows, and Windows RT.

The new Remote Desktop application is the latest in a series of gradual software launches for Apple's iOS platform from Microsoft. The biggest product still in the works, and hotly anticipated by iPad users, is a touch-optimized version of Microsoft Office.