I think this is the disconnect: It doesn't strike me that what I'm talking about has anything to do with "papers". So from your comment, I'm once again left wondering what you mean.

My sense is that I have a much better grasp of the foundational material here, having read in depth books and papers about that, but still can't quite wrap my head around the question of how people are actually "operationalizing" this into useful software.

But to your point about experimentation, it might just be the kind of thing where there is no path to enlightenment besides working on a project and running into and overcoming all the hurdles along the way.