Patent ID: 8259588

Claim:
A system, comprising: a gateway for intercepting request traffic, said gateway including a plurality of service interceptors that intercept a request flowing through said gateway in a particular sequence, wherein each of the plurality of interceptors performs at least one of the following functions upon having intercepted said request deny the request, allow the request, abstain from processing the request, pass the request to a next service interceptor, and modify data associated with said request; a configuration file containing data that specifies an interception point and an index for each of said plurality of service interceptors; an interceptor manager that reads the configuration file to register the plurality of service interceptors for the request, wherein the service interceptors are invoked for said request according to registration in said configuration file; and wherein after a request is received, a particular service interceptor is invoked and the particular service interceptor can determine whether the request violates a particular policy, and deny the request if it violates the particular policy, determine whether the request has been fulfilled without a need to invoke a plug-in or an application, and return the request if it has been fulfilled, determine whether there are additional service interceptors in the particular sequence that should be invoked, and if there are no more interceptors, pass the request to an appropriate plug-in or application, and if there are more interceptors to be invoked, pass the request to a next service interceptor in the particular sequence.