We interrupt our scheduled topic (a discussion of Web browser stuff I started last week) to bring you a Network World exclusive Gearhead review of a new virtualization product … vDesk from RingCube Technologies.

Virtualization has become, to say the least, big. Beyond server virtualization there’s another enormous virtualization opportunity that is relatively underused in the enterprise world: Desktop virtualization.

Most desktop virtualizing products are based on either thin client technologies delivered from a data center server (for example Citrix), or emulate the PC hardware environment of the client and run that virtual machine alongside the existing operating system (such as the VMware Player). These approaches both have drawbacks in terms of resource demands and support for mobile users.

VDesk takes a different and less resource demanding approach by using operating system virtualization on the client and, to meet enterprise oriented management requirements, adds a sophisticated centralized management system.

I’ve discussed operating system virtualization previously in Gearhead so I’ll just summarize the concept: Rather than creating a virtual hardware environment, operating system virtualization makes a copy of the host operating system interface so the virtualized environment can share the host operating system, thus requiring less memory and sucking up fewer cycles.

The vDesk system is based on RingCube’s MojoPac product which allowed you to create a virtual desktop but lacked enterprise manageability. This new incarnation adds the vDesk Administration Server (a simple and painless install) to provide just that.

You access the administration server through a Web browser to define users and groups and their privileges, set and edit policies, create virtualized desktop images, and control distribution and availability.

VDesk policies allow you to control, at a very detailed level, exactly what a specific user or group of users is allowed to do. For example, you can prohibit the ability to toggle between the virtual environment and the host environment, disable importing and exporting data, disable clipboard sharing between environments, set licensing terms (validation with the server determined by number of reboots or by the number of elapsed days), disable access to peripherals, and require that the host is running antivirus and or antispyware utilities).