diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index fe1d0c9..79f8a5f 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -1 +1,11 @@
-greenvironment-server
+# greenvironment-server
+
+Server of the greenvironment social network.
+
+## Install
+
+You need to install a nodejs runtime to run the greenvironment server. 
+Then you need to install all requirements. To do so, open a terminal in the
+greenvironment project folder and execute "npm i". You can build the project by
+executing "gulp" in the terminal. To run the server you need
+to execute "node ./dist".
diff --git a/src/app.ts b/src/app.ts
index bdb3fa3..3eee246 100644
--- a/src/app.ts
+++ b/src/app.ts
@@ -1,16 +1,43 @@
 import * as express from "express";
 import * as http from "http";
 import * as socketIo from "socket.io";
-
+import {DAO} from "./lib/DAO";
+import globals from "./lib/globals";
 class App {
     public app: express.Application;
     public io: socketIo.Server;
     public server: http.Server;
+    public dao: DAO;
 
     constructor() {
         this.app = express();
         this.server = new http.Server(this.app);
         this.io = socketIo(this.server);
+        this.dao = new DAO();
+    }
+
+    /**
+     * initializes everything that needs to be initialized asynchronous.
+     */
+    public async init() {
+        await this.dao.init();
+        this.app.all("/", (req, res) => {
+            res.send("WIP!");
+        });
+    }
+
+    /**
+     * Starts the web server.
+     */
+    public start() {
+        if (globals.config.server.port) {
+            globals.logger.info(`Starting server...`);
+            this.app.listen(globals.config.server.port);
+            globals.logger.info(`Server running on port ${globals.config.server.port}`);
+        } else {
+            globals.logger.error("No port specified in the config." +
+                "Please configure a port in the config.yaml.");
+        }
     }
 }
 
diff --git a/src/default-config.yaml b/src/default-config.yaml
index 6b7f17d..417ccda 100644
--- a/src/default-config.yaml
+++ b/src/default-config.yaml
@@ -8,4 +8,4 @@ database:
 
 # http server configuration
 server:
-  port:
+  port: 8080
diff --git a/src/index.ts b/src/index.ts
index 7e34c95..4e814b5 100644
--- a/src/index.ts
+++ b/src/index.ts
@@ -12,5 +12,7 @@ const defaultConfig = __dirname + "/default-config.yaml";
         await fsx.copy(defaultConfig, configPath);
     }
     const app = new App();
+    await app.init();
+    app.start();
 })();
 
diff --git a/src/lib/DAO.ts b/src/lib/DAO.ts
index 7d60b87..6349fa9 100644
--- a/src/lib/DAO.ts
+++ b/src/lib/DAO.ts
@@ -3,6 +3,7 @@ import globals from "./globals";
 import {QueryHelper} from "./QueryHelper";
 
 const config = globals.config;
+const tableCreationFile = __dirname + "/../sql/create-tables.sql";
 
 export class DAO {
     private queryHelper: QueryHelper;
@@ -14,6 +15,13 @@ export class DAO {
             port: config.database.port,
             user: config.database.user,
         });
-        this.queryHelper = new QueryHelper(dbClient);
+        this.queryHelper = new QueryHelper(dbClient, tableCreationFile);
+    }
+
+    /**
+     * Initializes everything that needs to be initialized asynchronous.
+     */
+    public async init() {
+        await this.queryHelper.createTables();
     }
 }
diff --git a/src/lib/QueryHelper.ts b/src/lib/QueryHelper.ts
index 7f22fb5..3431994 100644
--- a/src/lib/QueryHelper.ts
+++ b/src/lib/QueryHelper.ts
@@ -1,3 +1,4 @@
+import * as fsx from "fs-extra";
 import {Pool, PoolClient, QueryConfig, QueryResult} from "pg";
 import globals from "./globals";
 
@@ -47,10 +48,21 @@ export class SqlTransaction {
 export class QueryHelper {
     private pool: Pool;
 
-    constructor(pgPool: Pool) {
+    constructor(pgPool: Pool, private tableCreationFile?: string) {
         this.pool = pgPool;
     }
 
+    /**
+     * creates all tables needed if a filepath was given with the constructor
+     */
+    public async createTables() {
+        if (this.tableCreationFile) {
+            logger.info("Creating nonexistent tables...");
+            const tableSql = await fsx.readFile(this.tableCreationFile, "utf-8");
+            await this.query({text: tableSql});
+        }
+    }
+
     /**
      * executes the sql query with values and returns all results.
      * @param query
diff --git a/src/lib/globals.ts b/src/lib/globals.ts
index ddd044a..a64aaf0 100644
--- a/src/lib/globals.ts
+++ b/src/lib/globals.ts
@@ -14,7 +14,7 @@ namespace globals {
                     winston.format.timestamp(),
                     winston.format.colorize(),
                     winston.format.printf(({ level, message, label, timestamp }) => {
-                        return `${timestamp} [${label}] ${level}: ${message}`;
+                        return `${timestamp} ${level}: ${message}`;
                     }),
                 ),
             }),