Fights over. The guy with the knife killed you while you were putting the treads on[...]

This could go both ways actually. I'm sure even you could come up with some concrete examples of behemoths that came into an industry and just annihilated the competition, because they decided to go the extra mile, when everybody else had a myopic vision. FYI, the tank to the knife fight is not an approach that I necessarily embrace or advocate for. I'm merely stating here that vilifying the practice of foreseeing something bigger, as a counter-example of what constitute a "great" developer, doesn't necessarily work. Tell me a great developer has good judgment, just don't go as far as listing a developer's fascination for technology as a pathology. If it can be good, then leave it as an inconclusive attitude whose outcome is highly dependent on the dev's said judgment, or lack thereof and her ability to carry out the execution of what she undertook.

So you advocate over-engineering a just-in-case tour-de-force, instead of agile, iterative, responsive development. How are you getting up votes????

Nobody here advocates over-engineering, the term in itself is negative and the practice indefensible. My position is that "over-engineering" is a subjective thing, like judgment. You think we need a tunnel, I say we should build a bridge. We foresee different things, but the need is still to get across. Does our difference of opinion qualify you as "great"? The point of the segment you're referring to was that it is possible for something that was originally labeled "over-engineering" to become, in the right circumstances, "sound engineering".

The post listed traits found in very prominent in hackers but also found in ineffective, inexperienced hackers.

This is one problem I have with the article. Here's a specific excerpt:

[...]When given what has the oportunity to be a “fun problem,” developers without judgement tend to run to their cave to craft the most elegant solution possible. They have a natural desire to over design the solution either in terms of flexibility, speed, feature scope, or simply to get a chance to play with their new pet technology. They need to be constantly checked on to make sure they aren’t half way down a rabbit hole[...]

How many bad hackers have you encountered that were concerned with such things as flexibility, speed or feature scope? The description here is crafted in a way that superimpose hackers clichés with bad judgment. It doesn't segregate good or bad hackers, but it grabs traits that are generally seen as beneficial and just displays them in a bad light. It doesn't say "They have a natural desire to design the solution in terms of flexibility", but rather "They have a natural desire to _over design_" That, is my problem with it. You can make Dianne look good by all means, but you shouldn't have to make Jake look bad in order to do it (btw Jake is supposed to be a rockstar. Last time I checked, in the tech community, this is a guy who's taken his craft to new depths. As far inexperienced and ineffective go, this falls short).

I agree 100% that a prominent hacker uses the right tool for the job, but that's an effect, not a cause, of being a great hacker.