What do you do if you do not understand a CS concept/paper and you already graduated so there's no professors or TAs to help?

Context: I'm trying to implement an algorithm (has a paper also) but having a hard time understanding its different parts. Online implementations seem to be half-assed and/or are not working. Also, it's the internet, so many posts about the topic with only the same abstract explanation.

Redo uni

Find library that already implemented it
Find book (preferably O'Reilly) that contains it explained
U can try finding even video lesson with explanations

@rantsauce or if you wanna go full overachiever, contact the people who wrote the paper. Typically you should be able to get ahold of the codes since it's "open and public" science

Set up some tests and break down parts you do understand and try to see how they work. The more you can see what is going on the more it helps. If it is a common algorithm there might be a visualization of it that can help with intuitive understanding.

Draw it of possible.

Try to find explanations online and piece it together one by one into something that makes sense

Otherwise you will just have to push through the math line by line until you understand. It's not Impossible

@rantsauce bro just reach out to one of your professors. No shame in asking for help. In fact I think they'd appreciate that you thought of them.

I contacted some previous teachers and they were delighted to be given an interesting challenge.

Just make sure you frame the question well. Say what you've done so far. What you've tried, why you think it's not working.

Some amount of thought will be necessary.