> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://smartcloud.mintlify.site/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Reviews

> The maintainer review gate, requested reviewers and automatic approval.

The reviews feature runs on pull request events, including `pull_request_review`, so it re-evaluates whenever a review is submitted or dismissed. It is enabled by a `reviews` section.

```yaml theme={null}
roles:
  maintainers: [octocat, hubot, monalisa]
  trustedBots: ["dependabot[bot]"]

reviews:
  gate:
    outside: 2
    maintainer: 1
  requestApprovals:
    docs:
      reviewers: ["@monalisa"]
      when:
        condition:
          - type: filesMatch
            condition: "docs/**"
  automaticApprove:
    dependabot:
      message: Approved automatically for a dependency update.
      when:
        condition:
          - type: creatorMatches
            condition: "^dependabot\\[bot\\]$"
```

## The review gate

`gate` sets how many maintainer approvals a pull request needs before merge:

| Key          | Default | Applies when                    |
| ------------ | ------- | ------------------------------- |
| `outside`    | `2`     | The author is not a maintainer. |
| `maintainer` | `1`     | The author is a maintainer.     |

Each maintainer's latest decisive review counts: comments and pending reviews are ignored, and a later change request or dismissal withdraws an approval. The author's own review never counts.

* While fewer than two distinct maintainers are listed in `roles.maintainers` (logins compare ignoring case and a leading `@`), the gate is open and records a notice: the owner merges at their discretion.
* Pull requests from trusted bots skip the gate, with a notice.
* Too few approvals is an error with the rule id `REVIEW`, linking to `GOVERNANCE.md#review` under [`links.policyBase`](/configuration#links).

Make the `smartcloud / reviews` check required in the branch ruleset to enforce the gate.

## Requested reviewers

Each entry in `requestApprovals` requests reviews from its `reviewers` when its `when` passes. The pull request's author is left out, as GitHub rejects a request for your own review, and so is anyone who has already reviewed, since a new request would put them back on the pending list. A leading `@` on a login is optional.

## Automatic approval

Each entry in `automaticApprove` approves the pull request when its `when` passes, with its `message` as the review body (default: "Approved automatically by smartcloud."). One approval is made per run, by the first rule that passes.

smartcloud does not approve again while any reviewer's standing review is an approval, so new pushes do not stack approvals. Once a stale approval is dismissed, the next run approves again.

## Pull requests from forks

A pull request from a fork runs with a read-only token, so GitHub forbids requesting reviewers and approving. Each forbidden request or approval is reported as a warning (`reviews.requestApprovals` or `reviews.automaticApprove`) rather than failing the feature, and the review gate still runs. Any other error from GitHub still fails the feature.