Method and system for efficiently transacting an order and for communicating order information between a construction contractor and a construction material supplier

In a computer system, a method of automatically extracting quantity information from a construction drawing for an order for construction material, said construction drawing containing a plan layout marking a type and location of structural elements in readable text, and a table listing the structural elements and the structural elements' corresponding specification in readable text, said method comprising:

• opening said construction drawing and selecting said table in said construction drawing;
• searching said table based on a pre-determined set of guidelines and reading the text corresponding to said structural elements and structural elements' corresponding specification;
• interpreting the text based on a pre-determined set of rules to calculate quantity information for said structural elements;
• selecting said plan layout in said construction drawing;
• searching said plan layout and reading the text marking said structural elements;
• and
• calculating the quantity information for the order using said quantity information and said text marking said structural elements.

A method of efficiently communicating order information between a construction contractor and a construction material supplier, said method comprising:

• providing a project schedule to construction material supplier's server system and storing said project schedule in a database;
• determining a delivery schedule based on said project schedule and storing said delivery schedule in a database;
• and
• providing a construction contractor's client system access to said project schedule and delivery schedule from said server system.