Microsoft launches official Remote Desktop app for Apple's iOS

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.