It's been a while...
I was hoping to make this announcement earlier but it's been a busy university term and so I delayed until now. EduSweep 2.5 will be ready for release in early May if all goes to plan but, before that can happen, I need a crack team of beta testers ready to bend and break the new version before everyone else!
Beta testing involves running the software on non-critical data for about 1 - 3 weeks and simply reporting any oddities and suggesting improvements. You don't need to be a developer and you won't have to touch a line of code. If you're interested then post a reply here or drop me a PM. I expect to start beta testing in around 3 weeks - that's late March.
For the rest of you this becomes a preview post showcasing the new features you can expect. 
So what's new?
Lots is new and, thankfully, lots is not new. Keeping the user interface similar to 2.2 should mean that there's not too much to learn when upgrading. Many of the improvements are under the hood but there are a couple worth noting that you'll see day to day.
The task workflow has been overhauled so that creating signatures should be a thing of the past (although they're still there if you want them). You can now add file extensions, keywords and specific files that you want detected without having to create signatures so you can define more precisely what it is you're searching for.
The screenshot above shows the revised New Task window as well as a new method for adding paths - just type or paste a path and EduSweep will check its validity in real-time as you type. It's smart enough to let you add network paths when the host is offline as well. Then just hit enter to add it to your task. You can also now drag and drop folders from Windows Explorer and this new capability extends across the whole application.
Next up, ClamAV support. Probably the best free, open-source antivirus product and you can harness it within the application to scan targeted directories at the same time as your regular EduSweep scans. Or, if you prefer, EduSweep will virus scan only the files that get detected by a regular EduSweep scan. No need to worry about managing it either, the definition updates are handled by EduSweep's Online Update tool and there's no real-time scanner to slow down your system or interfere with existing antivirus software. That's the best type of AV - the type that's only there when you tell it to be!
Here's a scan in progress - notice how quickly the scan started? Near-instant startup times. You can expect that as standard now, however large the directory tree is that you're scanning. I think that was the most frequent feature request I had so it's great to have that solved for this new release.
Speaking of scanning, these options above are now applied per-task rather than globally. That's nice but even nicer is proper, algorithmic Flash detection to get those Flash files that are embedded in Office documents. Not as much of a problem as they were perhaps but still, it's nice to know they can't hide any more! 
Nothing huge here, just a nice little feature to have. The settings window now contains purge buttons so you can clear out your quarantine and report directories and see how much space they're using in your roaming profile.
The Full Monty - All Changes Since v2.2
Additions:
• ClamAV integration allows you to scan for viruses as part of your routine sweeps
• Proper heuristic detection of embedded flash games in Office documents
• The file inspector can now run as a standalone application from the Start Menu or command prompt
• The signature creator is now a part of the main application
• Drag and drop support for easier adding of folders to a task
• As-you-type validity checking on manually-entered paths
Improvements:
• Support for a wider variety of proxy server configurations
• Revised results browser makes sifting through files easier
• Redesigned task creation interface supports greater task granularity
• File inspector scan time has been reduced by up to 90% on very large files
• Near-instant task startup, even on huge directory trees
• Resource conservation mode can now be set per-task
• Improved logging of errors and warnings to help with future releases
• The quarantine folder and the reports directory can be emptied from the settings pane
• A full set of definitions is installed to your profile, removing the need for an initial update
• 10% faster scanning performance (feels like much more with the new instant startup)
Fixes:
• Crash when working with very large directory trees
• Crash when closing the file inspector during a scan
• Crash with ‘BadImageFormatException’ when starting task on Windows Vista and 7
• Crash when encountering invalid characters in a file extension or keyword
• Potential crash when checking for updates
• Files are removed from the results list on delete even if the delete operation failed
• Poor resizing of list column headers renders some text unreadable
• Network path might be erroneously marked as unavailable
• Files may be missed while scanning folders with empty subfolders
• Incorrect rendering of some user interface components
• Some incorrect dialog text when quarantining files
• Misc bug fixes on Windows Vista, Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008
• Resolve GPL incompatibility by using SharpZipLib in place of DotNetZip
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) so I'll leave it as a project for the weekend. Should have some PMs to send out on Monday. 
