Customer Reviews
they say on the title "an excellent book for beginners and occasional practioners" - By: tom57, 19 Jun 2007 
... & I agree. This is a book for molecular biologist who want to analyse their data using bioinformatics tools. I would prefer Baxevanis/Oullette "Bioinformatics: A Practical Guide to the Analysis of Genes & Proteins", however, if this is too expensive for you than this "Bioinformatics for Dummies" is the second best choice. Layout & index is a bit more confused but it covers most stuff you will need.
A word of warning: if you want to learn how the programs work, you have to look for a different type of book, e.g. "Biological Sequence Analysis: Probabilistic Models of Proteins & Nucleic Acids" by R. Durbin, Sean R. Eddy, Anders Krogh, & Graeme Mitchison or "Algorithmic Aspects of Bioinformatics" by Hans-Joachim Bockenhauer & Dirk Bongartz.
Clear and informative - By: , 26 Dec 2005 
So much of the information is this field (and indeed some of the applications which have been developed) seems almost intentially convoluted & difficult to understand. This book gives a very good overview of some of the more common programs that one will need to use if one is starting bioinformatics researchin a way that is practical & easy understand. Despite the title, the authors have done some good workin the field (I use Notredame's T-Coffee alignment program often) & are credible authoritiesin this area.