Code Review Workflow Examples

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These step-by-step workflows cover the full merge request review cycle: finding MRs that need your attention, reading their diffs, checking approval state, leaving notes and threaded discussions, and finally merging or rebasing. Each example pairs the prompt you type with the exact meta-tool action the server runs, so you can reuse the call directly.

MR review workflow

This is the core review loop: list the open MRs assigned to you, read the file changes, post review feedback, and approve once the code looks good. The diagram traces a single MR (!42) through that sequence.

sequenceDiagram
    participant U as User
    participant AI as AI Assistant
    participant MCP as MCP Server
    participant GL as GitLab API

    U->>AI: "Review MR !42"
    AI->>MCP: gitlab_merge_request (action: list)
    MCP->>GL: GET /projects/:id/merge_requests
    GL-->>MCP: MR list
    MCP-->>AI: Open MRs
    AI->>MCP: gitlab_merge_request (action: changes)
    MCP->>GL: GET /projects/:id/merge_requests/:iid/changes
    GL-->>MCP: Diff data
    MCP-->>AI: File changes
    AI->>MCP: gitlab_merge_request (action: note_create)
    MCP->>GL: POST /projects/:id/merge_requests/:iid/notes
    AI->>MCP: gitlab_merge_request (action: approve)
    MCP->>GL: POST /projects/:id/merge_requests/:iid/approve
    AI->>U: "Review complete, MR approved"

List MRs awaiting review

Prompt: “Show me all merge requests assigned to me for review in the backend project”

gitlab_merge_request → action: list, project_id: "my-group/backend",
  reviewer_username: "johndoe", state: "opened"

Returns: MR titles, authors, branches, labels, and review status.

Read MR changes

Prompt: “Show me the file changes in MR !42”

gitlab_merge_request → action: changes, project_id: "my-group/backend", merge_request_iid: 42

Returns: list of changed files with additions, deletions, and full diffs.

Check MR approval status

Prompt: “Who has approved MR !42 and who still needs to approve?”

gitlab_merge_request → action: approval_state, project_id: "my-group/backend",
  merge_request_iid: 42

Returns: approval rules, required approvals, current approvals, and eligible approvers.

Approve an MR

Prompt: “Approve merge request !42 in the backend project”

gitlab_merge_request → action: approve, project_id: "my-group/backend",
  merge_request_iid: 42

AI-powered code review

There is no separate “AI review” tool. AI-powered review happens when the assistant reads an MR’s diff with gitlab_merge_request → action: changes, reasons over the code, and then writes its findings back as notes or threaded discussions. A typical request — “Read the changes in MR !42 and flag any error-handling or security issues” — chains the read action above with the note_create and discussion_create actions below, all within a single conversation.

MR discussions and notes

Share review feedback directly on the MR. Post a single inline comment, open a threaded discussion for a larger topic, find threads that are still unresolved, or stage draft notes to publish your whole review at once.

Add a review comment

Prompt: “Add a comment to MR !42 saying ‘The error handling in auth.go needs a retry mechanism‘“

gitlab_merge_request → action: note_create, project_id: "my-group/backend",
  merge_request_iid: 42, body: "The error handling in auth.go needs a retry mechanism"

Create a discussion thread

Prompt: “Start a discussion on MR !42 about the database migration strategy”

gitlab_merge_request → action: discussion_create, project_id: "my-group/backend",
  merge_request_iid: 42, body: "Let's discuss the database migration strategy..."

List unresolved threads

Prompt: “Show me all unresolved discussion threads in MR !42”

gitlab_merge_request → action: discussion_list, project_id: "my-group/backend",
  merge_request_iid: 42

Filter the results for threads where resolved: false to find outstanding review items.

Use draft notes

Prompt: “Create a draft review note on MR !42 — I’ll publish all my comments together”

gitlab_merge_request → action: draft_note_create, project_id: "my-group/backend",
  merge_request_iid: 42, note: "Consider using a context timeout here..."

Draft notes are only visible to you until you publish them all at once with action: draft_note_publish_all.

MR lifecycle

Drive a merge request through its full lifecycle: open it from a feature branch, rebase it onto the latest target, merge it (optionally squashing), or close it when an approach is superseded.

Create an MR

Prompt: “Create a merge request from branch feature/auth-refactor to main in the backend project”

gitlab_merge_request → action: create, project_id: "my-group/backend",
  source_branch: "feature/auth-refactor", target_branch: "main",
  title: "Refactor authentication module"

Merge after approval

Prompt: “Merge MR !42 using squash commit”

gitlab_merge_request → action: merge, project_id: "my-group/backend",
  merge_request_iid: 42, squash: true

Rebase before merge

Prompt: “Rebase MR !42 against the latest main branch”

gitlab_merge_request → action: rebase, project_id: "my-group/backend",
  merge_request_iid: 42

Close without merging

Prompt: “Close MR !99 — the approach was superseded by MR !105”

gitlab_merge_request → action: update, project_id: "my-group/backend",
  merge_request_iid: 99, state_event: "close"

Compare branches

Before opening or merging an MR, compare two branches to see exactly what would change. The comparison returns the commits, changed files, and diff statistics between them.

Diff between branches

Prompt: “Compare the develop branch with main in the backend project”

gitlab_repository → action: compare, project_id: "my-group/backend",
  from: "main", to: "develop"

Returns: list of commits, changed files, and diff statistics between the two branches.

Maintained by José Manuel Requena PlensGitHub LinkedIn Mastodon Google Scholar