ThinRDP offers browser access to virtual desktops

Cybele Software has announced a beta release of ThinRDP, a platform that enables secure remote access to Terminal Services or virtual desktop sessions using a web browser as the client.

ThinRDP provides access to Windows applications and desktops using any modern HTML5 browser, rather than requiring the user to have some special software client installed on the endpoint, making access operating system independent.

According to Cybele, ThinRDP does not require Flash, Java, ActiveX or Silverlight support in the browser, but translates Microsoft's RDP screen protocol into Ajax content so that it can be displayed in a browser.

Customers need to deploy a ThinRDP Windows Server on their network, which serves up web pages to the client device via a single public IP address and port. It acts as a gateway to the RDP host, whether this is a Windows Terminal Server, virtual desktop infrastructure, or simply a Windows client on the LAN.

However, the ThinRDP Windows Server software can run on a Windows XP, Vista or Windows 7 PC as well as Windows Server 2008.

On the client side, ThinRDP supports IE9, Firefox, Chrome, Safari and other browsers on Windows PCs, Mac OS X and Linux, as well as Android and Apple iOS mobile devices.

A free 30-day trial version of the ThinRDP beta can be downloaded from Cybele's web site.

Pricing has yet to be decided, but is expected to be about $75 (£46) per user, with a possible introductoty offer of $59 (£36) per user, the company said.