VL/Hot creates standard .desktop specs files in the $HOME/Desktop dir. Any wm/filemanager which conform to this standard should handle them.
Hi Joe, nice to see you back. 
I just verified that VL-Hot works on my machine when using Light. I plug in a Linux formatted USB drive and two icons pop up on the desktop, one to explore the drive, and another to unmount it. This works under JWM and LXDE.
I know I have had issues in the past with NTFS partitions, it gets confused about how to mount those. Could those with problems please post what filesystem is involved?
Devices and filesystems tried so far with no results:
1. LiteON CD/DVD burner, USB, with any data CD or DVD
2. Lexar Jumpdrive (USB stick), 512MB, fat32
This one just worked when inserted! I still don't get an icon if it's already inserted at boot time. This definitely didn't work on the previous install.
3. 512MB CF card in a PCMCIA->CF converter, vfat (fat16)
Same as Jumpdrive -- just worked for the first time after removal and re-insertion.
That it's started working for me at all is very cool. I'd like it to work at boot time as well and I'll like the DVD/CD-ROM drive to be recognized the way Hal recognizes it.
Speaking of Hal, why is it a dependency for GIMP now? The last thing we need is Hal daemon running just for a photo editor. Grrr...
-Cait