As long as the rule is "no smoking in the
machine room:"
Who says there's no smoking in the machine room? One of the largest
computer systems ever built, the AN/FSQ-7, had operator consoles
with built-in ashtrays.
My only on-site call-out to France was a customer (just outside of
Paris) who had also
obviously never heard of the "no smoking" rule. This was the late 1990s
though,
so no real excuse!
Antonio