Ultrabay under Ubuntu 8.04 - hotswapping made easy
Thinkpads come with the handy bay, which differ in sizes, uses, etc. etc. Detailed descriptioni is available here.
Thinkwiki has a useful article on enabling them here.
But it does not work thanks to some issues with the kernel and module order. Don't ask me - I'm a transfer pricing manager, not an IT person. The solution is to change the initial kernel boot options