diff --git a/pom.xml b/pom.xml
index b48fdd3..0377aaa 100644
--- a/pom.xml
+++ b/pom.xml
@@ -12,6 +12,12 @@
             <version>3.4.0</version>
             <type>pom</type>
         </dependency>
+        <!-- https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/org.mariadb.jdbc/mariadb-java-client -->
+        <dependency>
+            <groupId>org.mariadb.jdbc</groupId>
+            <artifactId>mariadb-java-client</artifactId>
+            <version>3.0.3</version>
+        </dependency>
     </dependencies>
     <properties>
         <maven.compiler.source>17</maven.compiler.source>
diff --git a/src/main/java/linux/general/hackyquizbot/Main.java b/src/main/java/linux/general/hackyquizbot/Main.java
index d2eb2fa..55c03ed 100644
--- a/src/main/java/linux/general/hackyquizbot/Main.java
+++ b/src/main/java/linux/general/hackyquizbot/Main.java
@@ -8,23 +8,24 @@ import java.util.Date;
 import java.util.Scanner;
 
 public class Main {
+	public static final String startupTime = String.format("%1$tY-%1$tm-%1$td %1$tI:%1$tM:%1$tS%1$tp UTC%1$tz", new Date());
+	private static String[] commandLineArguments;
+
 
 	public static void main(String[] args) {
-		String startupTime = String.format("%1$tY-%1$tm-%1$td %1$tI:%1$tM:%1$tS%1$tp UTC%1$tz", new Date());
+		// [0] token, [1] db username, [2] db password
+		commandLineArguments = args;
 		
-		String token = args[0];
-		String db_username = args[1];
-		String db_password = args[2];
-		String db_name = "quizbot";
 		// CREATE TABLE questions(id INT(32) AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY, question TEXT, max_score INT(8));
 		// CREATE TABLE answer_coices(id INT(32), answer VARCHAR(2048), correctness BOOLEAN);
 		// CREATE TABLE user_answers(id INT(32), given_answer VARCHAR(2048), discord_user VARCHAR(1024));
 		// CREATE TABLE categories(id INT(32), category VARCHAR(1024));
 
+		// checks every 7500 ms if a deployment happened, if so shuts down the bot
 		CheckDeploy check = new CheckDeploy(7500, "/var/www/deployment/Hacky-Quizbot/id.txt");
 		check.start();
 
-		DiscordApi api = new DiscordApiBuilder().setToken(token).login().join();
+		DiscordApi api = new DiscordApiBuilder().setToken(commandLineArguments[0]).login().join();
 		
 		//Trivia management
 		Member member = new Member(api);
@@ -37,6 +38,10 @@ public class Main {
 		});
 
 	}
+	
+	public static String getCommandLineArgument(int index) {
+		return commandLineArguments[index];
+	}
 
 	//Deploy check thread
 	public static class CheckDeploy extends Thread {
diff --git a/src/main/java/linux/general/hackyquizbot/QuizBackend.java b/src/main/java/linux/general/hackyquizbot/QuizBackend.java
index aef9e7f..e2ed268 100644
--- a/src/main/java/linux/general/hackyquizbot/QuizBackend.java
+++ b/src/main/java/linux/general/hackyquizbot/QuizBackend.java
@@ -1,13 +1,27 @@
 package linux.general.hackyquizbot;
 
+import java.sql.Connection;
+import java.sql.DriverManager;
+import java.sql.SQLException;
 import java.util.ArrayList;
 
 public class QuizBackend {
 
+	private static final String dbUsername = Main.getCommandLineArgument(1);
+	private static final String dbPassword = Main.getCommandLineArgument(2);
+	private static final String dbName = "jdbc:mysql://localhost:3306/quizbot"; //we can make this configurable later
+
 	private static Question[] allQuestions;
 	private static String[] categories;
 	
 	static {
+		try (Connection connection = DriverManager.getConnection(dbName, dbUsername, dbPassword)) {
+		    System.out.println("Database connected!");
+		}
+		catch (SQLException e) {
+			System.err.println("Could not connect to DB.");
+			e.printStackTrace();
+		}
 		//TODO: populate allQuestions
 		//TODO: populate categories
 	}