Citrix produces software designed to facilitate secure access to virtualized applications and content. Citrix offers products for Windows, Macintosh, and Linux platforms. For more information, visit the Citrix web site.
At a basic level, Citrix XenApp is a software application that allows a company's IT or CAD Manager to provide access to business applications, such as Autodesk programs, to their employees from a server in a secure virtual environment. These applications are "published" for use by the company's staff who can access them through an internet connection from anywhere in the world.
Multiple users can access the same desktop or application simultaneously (provided that the application is capable of running multiple sessions side by side). Graphics are streamed to the user's desktop, and the user's mouse and keyboard input is streamed back to the server.
To the remote user, XenDesktop appears much like a remote desktop session. This environment is useful for delivering Autodesk programs and any number of business applications to multiple remote users, or even users in the same office. XenDesktop behaves similar to XenApp, but instead of the user being restricted to a window that contains only the application that has been made available, XenDesktop provides control of the entire remote desktop.