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A "C" coder is someone who writes bad code. It's relatively easy to detect and fire a "C" coder. A "B" coder is one who for the most part writes good code, but

A "C" coder is someone who writes bad code. It's relatively easy to detect and fire a "C" coder. A "B" coder is one who for the most part writes good code, but doesn't design a good long-term architecture, or makes many small mistakes that add up in the long run, or leaves the code riddled with small bugs that eventually cause frequent problems. The "B" coders are the dangerous ones because really you should fire them or fix them, but it's too easy to ignore them. An "A" coder writes solid code and is dependable, but doesn't hit the high notes, as Joel Spolsky says. A star coder is an "A" coder who hits the high notes. (I don't know what a "D" coder is, but perhaps our scales are offset by one letter grade.)

spitfire 16y ago
A "D" coder is outsourcing. or code that is bad, runs slowly, has bugs and is often incomplete. Oftentimes things are written in one heroic coding session and simply cannot be touched after that. BUT it meets the "specs". ooowww I've seen some of that. An "A" coder's code is simple to spot: It's boring. There's nothing heroic or clever (that's hard to debug) it's well documented so even junior devs can understand it, and thought has been taken so that it can be extended in the future. To put it simply it shows taste*. That is a rare thing indeed.