I have received financial aid because I was interested in the bioinformatics field and was reading alot about it and wanted to start my first course, it was my biggest mistake that I have chosen this course. It is awfully explained, terrible accent, basically a course with 50% information for beginners and 50% for coders and the quiz for week 2 just pumped my blood pressure to the roof, this course is in no way to be called for beginners and the interactive text is a mess and it is no way as a biotechnologist that I am going to recommend this course to anyone !, I need to apologize for coursera company for giving me aid for this COURSE !

note : this course is basically like a money grab, it is not enough that you are on their course they actually from Minute one advertise for their book vol 1 and 2... such a joke.

All in all I am stopping this course because the knowledge I am gaining from this course is 1 on the scale of 10, and the amount of confusion and frustration and disappointment I am getting is 10 on the scale of 10 !!

I really hope coursera can forgive my dropping out of this course and allows me to get a financial aid at an actual course

Very tough but rewarding class. The programming part was easy, the algorithms kicked my butt. Love the challenge and can't wait to take the rest!!! Such an interesting field!

This course is really frustrating if you are not a computer scientist.

The 'language-neutral pseudocode' given on the computer science tasks is buggy and hard to figure out and there is no support or solutions. This course is just hours spent rerunning your code by brute force to pray you get to their answer to pass.

Work is not explained well. The only reason to take this course is that its supported by UCSD.

This course is very very good. Challenging at times. It does not hold your hand at all times and sometimes requires research to solve some of the problems, but I like the community and the approach.

Good course, very solid community.

Excelente!!!

Very well explained. I'm a molecular biologist seeking for some programming skills and understanding of the basics of the everydays tools. I've found some caveats in the coding problems from stepik but I understand that's difficult to give complete and exact explanations to everyone and every programming language that someone can use. Besides that everything's perfect! And recommended!

Unfortunately, as often happens, what is "simple" and basic for one is not that for another. This course presumes a comfortableness with coding that I simply do not possess as a teacher of high school science. Please try and develop a true introductory course that normal, non-programmers can access. Thanks!

The strong accent of one of the teachers made me just leave the course after the first video, sadly.

Videos and content are unrelated. Stepik application doesn't accept our answers even if it is true!

For computer scientists, not biologists

not for beginners

This course was fun and very rewarding, I feel like I learned a lot about both algorithms and biology.

I have completed the Honors track---coming from a computer science background the algorithmic parts were mostly easy for me (I generally came up with all the algorithms on my own) but still fun to work through, especially because of their connection to real-world biology problems.

Interesting as the biological motivations had been they really only scratched the surface and made me want to learn more. For that I worked through the online MIT biology course [1] led by Eric Lander (of the Human Genome Project fame) that I cannot recommend enough.

[1] https://courses.edx.org/courses/course-v1:MITx+7.00x+2T2017/course/

The course was very well designed to engage any one with CS background to get highly motivated to learning Bioinformatics. Personally, I have found the humorous representations of the instructors very appealing and also enjoyed the programming challenges. Moreover, it helped me to develop an insight to connect my CS knowledge for solving Biological problems. I am looking forward to completing the full specialization.

This course is really educational and well designed. The course content is well structured and clearly described. If you have no previous knowledge in this topic, I would recommend to start with the beginner's course "Biology Meets Programming: Bioinformatics for Beginners" in order to be prepared for concepts like pseudocode or the computational way of thinking in general.

Definitely recommended!

Well made introduction into the field. Good programming exercises which are easy to medium difficulty with a computer science background. It feels like they put a lot of thought into the course structure. Some of the biological explanations are too brief without a biological background, and I would guess the same for students without a computer science background regarding the exercises.

This was fantastic course! I've never experienced such passion in an online course. I've learned so much, and I am striving for more... fortunately this is just the beginning. No wonder it has been proclaimed as one of the 50 most popular MOOCs of all time. Not because it is popular you should take it, it has become popular because it is just marvellous.

Worth it!

A well-structured and amazing course that provides a wealth of knowledge in bioinformatics including an optional honors track for programming. Thoroughly enjoyed it and excited to continue with the rest of the Specialization! A big thank you to the creators of this brilliant course. Simply one of the best courses on Coursera!

One of the best online courses I've ever taken. Since I come from a biotechnology background, this course was particularly relevant for me in terms of its depth and thoroughness. Seriously considering a future in computational biology, thanks to this course.

Very good course, but at the same time very hard. Unless you have quite a bit of experience programing, be prepared to spend at least 15 hours a week working on this class. The good news is that if you do spend that time, you will learn a lot.

Excellent course. It can be tough at times but it is amazingly accessible to all who are genuinely interested. The final assignment was very well prepared and gave a real hands-on experience that puts the course into practice.

Exceptionally beautiful course. Must be for those want to start career in bioinformatics. But prior basic knowledge in any programming language would be appropriate if someone wants to extract every aspect of this course.

Excellent introduction to bioinformatics. They put a lot of heart and thought into the design of the course. I will continue to use the concepts I've learned in and out of bioinformatics.

The material of the course is simply exquisitely presented. The concepts are clear, easy to grasp. You won't be a bioinformatician after doing this course, but you'll make the first step.

Excellent course. The Stepik grading could use a couple of tweaks and perhaps a bit more debugging, but it was an excellent blend of bioinformatics, molecular biology, and programming.

Overall, the course is great. However, in the week 4, the quality of pseudocode is not as good, it is much harder to follow. Would love to have had a more extensive explanation.