Enforce Enterprise-Grade Governance with Advanced Merge Policies

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G’day Everyone!

Back with Week 5 of our use-case series exploring how Izymes apps help enterprise engineering teams ship quickly while staying fully compliant.

Last week we dove into Workzone’s Merge Control, showing how automated, policy-driven merges protect critical branches and guarantee only fully-reviewed, fully-built code is merged.

This week we’re taking merge governance even further with Workzone’s Advanced Merge Conditions.
Using powerful boolean logic and group-level approvals, you can define merge policies that satisfy complex compliance frameworks (FDA, ISO, SOX, PCI) and layered SDLC requirements, think conditional approvals like “at least 50% of reviewers OR 2 senior engineers” and “minimum 2 digital signatures,” all tied to specific files or modules.

For enterprises that demand airtight traceability and separation of duties, this is the ultimate merge policy engine.

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In highly regulated or multi-team engineering environments, approvals and CI requirements often go beyond simple checklists. Different teams own different modules, some reviewers hold greater responsibility, and compliance obligations demand traceability, separation of duties, and contextual awareness of code changes.

Workzone’s Advanced Merge Conditions allow enterprises to define nuanced and enforceable merge policies using a powerful boolean logic engine—far beyond the capabilities of native Bitbucket Server/Data Center merge checks.

Example Scenario: A MedTech Company with Layered SDLC Requirements

A medical device company uses Bitbucket Data Center to manage firmware code, application code, and test scripts in a mono-repo. It must comply with CFR Part 11, ISO 27001, and internal security policy. The company defines rules like:

• All changes must be reviewed by at least 50% of assigned reviewers OR by at least 2 senior engineers (group: dev-leads)
• All test script updates must be reviewed and signed by QA (group: qa-team)
• Code cannot be merged unless at least 2 digital signatures are present (for compliance)
• At least one successful CI build is required for all merges

With Workzone’s boolean merge expression, the policy is implemented as:

(requiredBuildsCount > 0) & (filePathMergeChecksPass == true) & ((approvalQuota >= 50% | groupQuota['dev-leads'] >= 2) & requiredSignaturesCount >= 2)

This ensures that:

• CI pipelines must pass
• QA sign-off is enforced on test changes (via filePathMergeChecksPass)
• Compliance is satisfied either through majority approval, senior review, or digital signatures

Flexible Control at the Group Level

Workzone also supports specific group-level approval thresholds, for example:

groupQuota['security-team'] >= 2 & groupQuota >= 1

This guarantees that a minimum number of reviewers from the security team approve any PR that affects security-sensitive files, while still requiring participation from other teams.

This is particularly valuable in enterprises where:

• Teams are fluid and members move often
• Responsibility is shared, but accountability is explicit
• Some modules (e.g., auth, billing, infrastructure) require heightened review

Precision with File/Module-Level Enforcement

Workzone’s filePathMergeChecksPass == true ensures that merge logic honors file/module-specific approval rules. For example, PRs that touch src/test/** or infra/k8s/** won’t be allowed through unless reviewers responsible for those paths have approved—even if the general conditions are satisfied.

Enterprise Value:

• Satisfies multi-layer compliance frameworks (FDA, ISO, SOX, PCI)
• Implements separation of duties with named group logic
• Reduces merge risk by ensuring the right people have reviewed and signed
• Meets audit requirements with verifiable digital signatures
• Automates merge decisions to boost velocity without compromising governance

Thanks for tuning in! 

If you found this insightful, you can learn more about Workzone for Bitbucket (Cloud & DC!) here...

Until next time! 

Sean

Izymes Team