Update README.md

Added pre-reqs & installation steps

Author: beingnishas

README.md

@@ -4,6 +4,44 @@ Gitlab MCP (ModelContextProvider) server
 
 ---
 
+## 📦 Installation
+
+### Prerequisites
+
+- Python 3.11 or higher
+- Running MCP server(s)
+- Cursor as MCP client
+- Podman(If running as containers)
+
+### Method 1: local setup in venv
+
+```bash
+git clone [email protected]:redhat-ai-tools/gitlab-mcp.git
+cd gitlab-mcp
+python3 -m venv venv
+source venv/bin/activate
+pip install -r requirements.txt
+```
+Set MCP env vars, if not set everything else will fallback to default except MCP_GITLAB_TOKEN.
+If everything is set, Test this setup using:
+```
+python gitlab_mcp_server.py
+INFO:__main__:🔒 Max API calls/hour: 100
+INFO:__main__:🔒 Allowed actions: ['read']
+INFO:__main__:🔒 Allowed repos: [<your allowed repo list>]
+INFO:__main__:🔗 GitLab URL: <if gitlab URL is provided it will show up here, else the default value will appear>
+🚀 Starting GitLab MCP Server (FastMCP - Read-Only)...
+📋 Available Tools:
+   🔍 search_repositories - Search/filter repositories
+   📋 list_issues - List project issues
+   🔀 list_merge_requests - List merge requests
+   🏗️  list_pipelines - List CI/CD pipelines
+   ⚙️  list_jobs - List pipeline jobs
+   ❌ check_latest_failed_jobs - Check failed jobs
+   📝 list_latest_commits - List recent commits
+```
+Interrupt Ctrl+C, and add this to Cursor config as shown in next steps.
+
 ## Running locally in a MCP client like cursor
 
 To run this MCP server from cursor. Go to cursor settings -> Tools & integrations -> Add MCP server
@@ -13,19 +51,19 @@ To run this MCP server from cursor. Go to cursor settings -> Tools & integration
   "mcpServers": {
       "gitlab-mcp-local": {
        "command": "python",
-       "args": ["gitlab_mcp_server.py"],
+       "args": ["<your venv absolute path>/gitlab_mcp_server.py"],
        "trust": true
      }
   }
 }
 ```
 
-## Building locally
-
-To build the container image locally using Podman, run:
+### Method 2: Container build
 
-```sh
-podman build -t gitlab-mcp-server:latest -f Containerfile .
+```bash
+git clone [email protected]:redhat-ai-tools/gitlab-mcp.git
+cd gitlab-mcp
+podman build -t gitlab-mcp-server:latest  .
 ```
 
 This will create a local image named `gitlab-mcp-server:latest` that you can use to run the server.