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Sometimes, there is a specific question with a specific answer which is simply a more general problem and its solution (for which there is no post on the site) applied to the situation of the OP, maybe with some slight addition or modification.

When someone else checks the question while looking for an answer to the general problem, he or she has to go through all the specifics that the OP provided, which is just clutter slowing your way to the solution.

Is creating a new general question for future reference deemed appropriate?
If not, is there something to be done in order to help future searches?

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Is creating a new general question for future reference deemed appropriate?

If you do, the post will get closed as a duplicate of the more specific question.

If not, is there something to be done in order to help future searches?

Yes. If, the added details/requirements are unimportant/unnecessary/painfully obvious and aren't essential to the question itself, then edit the post, for example,

How do I write a program that adds two numbers together on a computer that uses an LCD screen and has water cooled internals?

Can be edited to become,

How do I write a program that adds two numbers together?

Since every programmer knows a computer has a screen and some form of cooling, and these details also have absolutely nothing to do with writing such a program. Another example,

How do I write a program that adds two numbers together on Windows XP that has a maximum of 256MiB of RAM?

This question can not be "generalised", as the requirements here are essential to the actual question and will affect the answers.

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