Patent ID: 8402525

Claim:
A process comprising: receiving, at a server-side web service provider computing platform, a web service request for a particular web service, along with user identification credentials comprising an application identification (“ID”) and password, from a web service subscribing application within a client-side computing platform, said web service request and said user identification credentials received into a service agent executing within the server-side web service provider computing platform; determining by the service agent executing within the server-side web service provider computing platform whether said user identification credentials are cached in a cache in said service agent, and further, whether said user identification credentials are valid, and further, whether said user identification credentials are associated with the requested particular web service in said cache in said service agent; in response to a determination that said user identification credentials are not cached in said service agent, communicating, by the service agent executing within the server-side web service provider computing platform, with a security gateway within a web service management platform that is separate from both said client-side computing platform and said server-side web service provider computing platform to authorize said subscribing application within said client-side computing platform to access said particular web service, said communicating being transparent to said client-side computing platform; in response to the determination that said user identification credentials are cached in said service agent and are invalid, sending by the server-side web service provider computing platform a response to said web service subscribing application within said client-side computing platform with an error message; and in response to the determination that said user identification credentials are cached in said service agent, are valid, and are associated with the requested particular web service in said cache in said service agent, passing by the service agent executing within the server-side web service provider computing platform said particular web service request received from said subscribing application to said web service to access said requested particular web service in said server-side web service provider computing platform in accordance with a service level agreement between a web service subscriber and a server-side provider to provide said particular web service to said web service subscribing application; wherein said service agent executing within the server-side web service provider computing platform does not receive information about said security gateway along with said web service request received from said web service subscribing application.