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The question of VDI use cases, customer awareness, and Desktop Virtualization has been a hot topic lately at Citrix. Harry Labana's blog post did a great job describing the differences in Desktop Virtualization and Server Virtualization. In addition to the positive reviews a few commenter's have also brought up some scenarios we have been considering but have not made available to date. Specifically we have been discussing ways to make HDX more pervasive and useful to IT Pro's and users. HDX has significant benefits and we want the broader industry to try it out and get a taste of XenDesktop.
Many in the community may recall a Citrix project called PortICA which led to a component of XenDesktop providing a direct ICA connection from a Client OS ( XP or Vista ) to any endpoint with the ICA client. Outside of Citrix developers & testers ( and a few others 
) who find this very useful, we have not opened up this stand alone capability to the world. If we did make this available, meaning an MSI including the enhanced HDX features that could be installed inside a client OS which could connect directly ( no broker ) to any device with the Citrix Receiver and proper network configuration. The question is what would you use it for ? Would this lead to increased XenDesktop adoption? Some of the XenDesktop product and demo scenarios we have considered or heard are listed below. Please let us know your vote and help describe some new use cases as well.
( Note that this is simply a survey and does not imply what plans we may or may not have )
Also check out Brian Madden's post on the topic and additional commenters views.
There seems to be some confusion about XenDesktop relating to where it can run the workstations. The name XenDesktop implies that it can only run with Xen but the truth is that it has been designed for running on other platforms as well. Specifically, it can run on individual workstations (without virtualization), blade servers (also without virtualization), and virtualization servers. The key message is that other VM providers can be supported as well.
XenDesktop really is not about locking you into a particular solution but rather to give you flexibility to create an environment that you want and can support.
The model is not radically new but it is new for Citrix to be embracing this model fully with an intent to have a full solution across the whole application delivery market (including desktop delivery).
The key technology for enabling the remoting of workstations is codenamed "PortICA" and has now been in development for more than two years. PortICA allows Windows XP and Vista to be accessed remotely using standard ICA Clients and using standard Citrix infrastructure. The goal of PortICA has been to port elements of Presentation Server to a workstation and that goal is almost complete.
PortICA is a project based out of Advanced Products in Sydney, Australia. The team consists of six developers. I'm only mentioning this to convey how big things can come from small teams. The Advanced Products team in Sydney has produced a number of products and enhancements over the years including things like the Citrix Secure Gateway, Seamless support, SmartAuditor, AIE (App isolation), SpeedScreen (various flavours), ZL (Zero Latency), ICA Client Object, and Pictor. It is a solid team with diverse experience. The only limit the group has is based on not having enough people to tackle bigger or more projects.