Feature Request: Extend OpenAPI Support to 3.1.1 Across All Outbound REST Nodes in IBM ACE

BM App Connect Enterprise V13 already supports OpenAPI 3.0 for inbound REST API definitions. We now request an extension of this existing support to cover OpenAPI 3.1.1 — the current stable and recommended version of the specification — specifically across all outbound REST nodes.

Affected nodes:

The following three nodes currently accept only a Swagger 2.0 definition file when configuring the target external API, and should be extended to support OpenAPI 3.1.1:

• RESTRequest node — used to issue synchronous requests to external REST APIs
• RESTAsyncRequest node — used to initiate asynchronous requests to external REST APIs
• RESTAsyncResponse node — used to receive the asynchronous response, paired with the RESTAsyncRequest node

All three nodes rely on an attached API definition file to determine endpoint URL, path, operation, and parameter encoding. Today that file must be in Swagger 2.0 format. We request that OpenAPI 3.1.1 documents be accepted as a valid alternative in all three nodes.

Why 3.1.1 specifically: OpenAPI 3.1.1, released in October 2024, is the OpenAPI Initiative's current recommended version for all new and upgraded projects. Key improvements over 3.0 include full JSON Schema 2020-12 alignment, native webhook support, improved schema expressiveness, and enhanced security scheme definitions — all of which appear regularly in modern third-party API specifications that ACE customers need to consume.

Business justification: Customers are increasingly receiving API specifications from partners and vendors in OpenAPI 3.1.x format. Without native support in the RESTRequest, RESTAsyncRequest and RESTAsyncResponse nodes, integration teams are forced to manually downconvert these specs to Swagger 2.0 — a process that is error-prone, time-consuming, and unsustainable at scale. Since the OpenAPI 3.0 parsing infrastructure already exists in ACE V13, extending it to cover 3.1.1 on the outbound side represents an incremental and well-justified improvement.