Wikimedia Engineering/2014-15 Goals/Q3

Strategic context for this quarter:
 * We are renewing our focus on VisualEditor as a core commitment we must deliver at a high level of quality, to make it easier for anyone to edit our projects. After two quarters of foundational work, many key bockers have been addressed and we are confident that we can make a successful push toward wider usage.
 * On the mobile web, we continue to focus on contributions beyond editing. While we have seen success and growth of mobile editors, we recognize that the mobile web is not simply a smaller version of the desktop, and offers new opportunities for casual participation. This quarter, we are calling out specifically the work on the mobile web, but the work in apps continues, consolidating and building on the readership focused features we launched last quarter.
 * We have long committed to being a data-driven organization. In order to make data a part of every product team's day-to-day decision-making, we need to ensure that key metrics are reliably collected (instrumentation). This is still an organization-wide issue, and we are therefore calling it out as a top priority. Beyond merely counting individual user actions, we are especially interested in making visible the drop-off/conversion rates for key user actions like editing and uploading in a consistent manner (funnel analysis).

What we are consciously not yet calling out as a top priority:
 * The Wikidata Query Service. We are continuing work on this project, prototyping different technical solutions and specifically using the mobile web team's work and the existing WDQ-based tools to inform requirements. However, we recognize that we are still in the prototyping stage, and we're not yet staffed to make this a top priority for this quarter.
 * SOA Auth. The priorities of the services engineering team in particular will need to be fully aligned with shipping VisualEditor and mobile features, so we are reluctant to call out any specific service that may need to be de-prioritized.
 * Fundraising refactor / A/B testing. With the analytics team focused on instrumentation and fundraising-tech busy with post-fundraiser cleanup and payment processing related work, now is not the best time for a major cross-functional initiative to consolidate e.g. A/B testing functionality across teams.
 * Front-end standardization / UX standardization work. This will take a backseat to VisualEditor work this quarter (many of the same individuals are involved), and deliverables will be scoped accordingly.

For discussion and context see the talk page.