Runtime Downstream Invocation

Purpose

This functional area performs the governed downstream call to the target system after tool input has been prepared.

By the time execution reaches this step, the Runtime has already translated the caller payload from ExposedFieldName to SourceFieldName. The downstream invocation layer therefore operates on the source-shaped request and returns the raw downstream source-shaped response to the response transformation step.

Main Capabilities

• target-system based REST and SOAP execution
• endpoint-specific authentication binding
• outbound host restriction enforcement
• guarded redirect handling
• SOAP envelope generation and normalized SOAP response handling
• multipart/form-data request construction for binary inputs
• absolute endpoint execution when a tool already carries a full target URL
• mutual TLS (client certificate) execution for both REST and SOAP tools bound to a client-certificate auth profile

REST And SOAP Execution Details

For REST-style execution, the Runtime can:

• compose a target URL from the target-system base URL and mapped source path
• merge mapped request bodies with credential-provided headers, query parameters, and cookies
• omit request bodies for methods and schemas that do not require one

For SOAP-style execution, the Runtime can:

• build SOAP 1.1 or SOAP 1.2 envelopes
• inject SOAPAction in the protocol-appropriate location
• include SOAP security material such as UsernameToken, UsernameTokenDigest, and custom SOAP headers
• normalize SOAP body or fault payloads back into structured JSON for downstream response transformation

Functional Value

This is the point where AI requests become actual business-system calls, so it must remain controlled, predictable, and observable across both REST and SOAP integrations.