Patent Issued for Hybrid cloud application programming interface management platform (USPTO 11457004): Aetna Inc.

2022 OCT 17 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- Aetna Inc. (Hartford, Connecticut, United States) has been issued patent number 11457004, according to news reporting originating out of Alexandria, Virginia, by NewsRx editors.

The patent’s inventors are Arnold, Joseph (Hartford, CT, US), Jensen, Claus T. (Pawling, NY, US), Solinger, Erik (Hartford, CT, US).

This patent was filed on December 3, 2019 and was published online on September 27, 2022.

From the background information supplied by the inventors, news correspondents obtained the following quote: “Cloud-based applications or services are deployed for a variety of tasks. Service Providers manage servers, or rent network resources from cloud service providers, to run the services. Organizations may run private clouds that are restricted to be used internally among the organization’s clients, or the organizations may run public clouds that expose those services to external clients through a wide area network (WAN) such as the Internet.

“As the breadth of services available through public clouds or private clouds increases, organizations can leverage these services to build applications with a large amount of functionality. The applications can call services within the private cloud or public clouds to perform various tasks. The availability of these services makes deploying new applications easier because developers are not required to write code for performing tasks already handled by existing services.

“However, utilizing services throughout the hybrid cloud architecture can be challenging. For example, each service implemented by a different service provider can utilize a different application programming interface (API). Furthermore, after the initial deployment, an API for a particular service utilized by an application can change as the service provider updates the code for their service. This can break the functionality of the application. In addition, each service may handle authentication and authorization of service calls differently. The application may need to maintain accounts with each service provider and include special functionality for authenticating a service call with the third-party API for the service. These aspects, among others, can make developing applications in a hybrid cloud architecture more difficult.”

Supplementing the background information on this patent, NewsRx reporters also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “The following describes a technique for managing the deployment of APIs within a hybrid cloud network architecture. APIs can be created for applications or services deployed to a hybrid cloud including public clouds and/or private clouds. The APIs are deployed to API gateways associated with each data center in the hybrid cloud network. Each API should be deployed as close to the underlying service and/or data accessed through the API as possible. The API gateways are mapped to the network locations for the API gateways by interacting with Domain Name System (DNS) name servers that map domain names for the API gateways to an address for the API gateways. API calls can then use the domain names as included in the DNS records maintained by the DNS name servers.

“In an embodiment, a system is disclosed for managing services within a hybrid cloud architecture. The system includes at least one processor configured to deploy APIs to a plurality of API gateways accessible via a network. The network is divided into one or more spaces, each space in the one or more spaces corresponding to a set of API gateways deployed to one or more geographical regions. Each API gateway is connected to a number of services executing on a cluster of runtime devices connected to the API gateway.

“In an embodiment, the at least one processor is configured to deploy APIs to at least two API gateways associated with at least two different spaces.

“In an embodiment, an organization that develops the APIs is different from an external organization that develops at least one service in the number of services. The external organization maintains a data center that includes at least one API gateway configured to receive an API from the at least one processor via the network.

“In an embodiment, the at least one processor is configured to interact with one or more DNS name servers to map a fully qualified domain name to an Internet Protocol (IP) address for a corresponding API gateway. In some embodiments, the at least one processor is configured to interact with at least two DNS name servers for at least two different domains corresponding to at least two branded organizations. In an embodiment, the fully qualified domain name includes a DNS prefix that indicates a particular space associated with the corresponding API gateway. In one embodiment, interacting with one or more DNS name servers comprises at least one of adding, deleting, or modifying a CNAME record. In some embodiments, the at least one processor is further configured to update a security certificate to add the fully qualified domain name to a subject alternative name (SAN) field of the security certificate.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. A system for managing services within a hybrid cloud architecture, the system comprising: at least one processor configured to deploy application programming interfaces (APIs) to a plurality of API gateways accessible via a network, wherein the network is divided into one or more spaces, each space in the one or more spaces corresponding to a set of API gateways deployed to one or more geographical regions, and wherein each API gateway is connected to a number of services executing on a cluster of runtime devices connected to the API gateway.

“2. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is configured to deploy APIs to at least two API gateways associated with at least two different spaces.

“3. The system of claim 1, wherein an organization that develops the APIs is different from an external organization that develops at least one service in the number of services, and wherein the external organization maintains a data center that includes at least one API gateway configured to receive an API from the at least one processor via the network.

“4. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one processor is configured to interact with one or more Domain Name System (DNS) name servers to map a fully qualified domain name to an Internet Protocol (IP) address for a corresponding API gateway.

“5. The system of claim 4, wherein the at least one processor is configured to interact with at least two DNS name servers for at least two different domains corresponding to at least two branded organizations.

“6. The system of claim 4, wherein the fully qualified domain name includes a DNS prefix that indicates a particular space associated with the corresponding API gateway.

“7. The system of claim 4, wherein interacting with one or more DNS name servers comprises at least one of adding, deleting, or modifying a CNAME record.

“8. The system of claim 4, wherein the at least one processor is further configured to update a security certificate to add the fully qualified domain name to a subject alternative name (SAN) field of the security certificate.

“9. The system of claim 1, the system further comprising: an API portal configured to authenticate users and provide authenticated users visibility to one or more catalogs of products, wherein each catalog is associated with a domain and includes one or more products associated with the domain.

“10. The system of claim 9, wherein each product corresponds to one or more APIs, and wherein a consumer of the product subscribes to at least one plan that defines a rate limit for the product.

“11. The system of claim 1, wherein at least one API gateway is designated as internal and at least one additional API gateway is designated as external.

“12. The system of claim 1, wherein each API is permitted to call services within a data center in which the API is deployed, and each API is prohibited from calling services in other data centers directly.

“13. The system of claim 1, wherein each API gateway includes an authentication engine configured to generate a token for an authenticated consumer application, wherein the token is generated based on a shared secret provided to the plurality of API gateways, and wherein the authenticated consumer application is configured to utilize the token when connecting to other API gateways in the plurality of API gateways.

“14. A method for managing services within a hybrid cloud architecture, the method comprising: receiving one or more application programming interfaces (APIs) that correspond to one or more services available over a network; and deploying the one or more APIs to a plurality of API gateways accessible via the network, wherein each API gateway is associated with a space that corresponds with one or more geographical regions.

“15. The method of claim 14, wherein deploying the one or more APIs to the plurality of API gateways comprises: for each API in the one or more APIs: identifying a particular space corresponding to the API, and transmitting the API to one or more API gateways associated with the particular space.

“16. The method of claim 14, further comprising: interacting with one or more Domain Name System (DNS) name servers to map a fully qualified domain name to an Internet Protocol (P) address for a corresponding API gateway; and updating a security certificate to add the fully qualified domain name to a subject alternative name (SAN) field of the security certificate.

“17. The method of claim 14, wherein each API gateway includes an authentication engine configured to: generate a token for an authenticated consumer application, wherein the token is generated based on a shared secret provided to the plurality of API gateways, and wherein the authenticated consumer application is configured to utilize the token when connecting to other API gateways in the plurality of API gateways.

“18. A non-transitory computer-readable medium storing instructions that, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to manage services within a hybrid cloud architecture by performing steps comprising: receiving one or more application programming interfaces (APIs) that correspond to one or more services available over a network; and deploying the one or more APIs to a plurality of API gateways accessible via the network, wherein each API gateway is associated with a space that corresponds with one or more geographical regions.

“19. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 18, wherein deploying the one or more APIs to the plurality of API gateways comprises: for each API in the one or more APIs: identifying a particular space corresponding to the API, transmitting the API to one or more API gateways associated with the particular space.

“20. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 18, the steps further comprising: interacting with one or more Domain Name System (DNS) name servers to map a fully qualified domain name to an Internet Protocol (IP) address for a corresponding API gateway; and updating a security certificate to add the fully qualified domain name to a subject alternative name (SAN) field of the security certificate.

“21. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 18, wherein each API gateway includes an authentication engine configured to: generate a token for an authenticated consumer application, wherein the token is generated based on a shared secret provided to the plurality of API gateways, and wherein the authenticated consumer application is configured to utilize the token when connecting to other API gateways in the plurality of API gateways.”

For the URL and additional information on this patent, see: Arnold, Joseph. Hybrid cloud application programming interface management platform. U.S. Patent Number 11457004, filed December 3, 2019, and published online on September 27, 2022. Patent URL: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=11457004.PN.&OS=PN/11457004RS=PN/11457004

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