I agree that it's a personal preference. For the space between a patio door and cabinets, I'd prefer not to see a narrow 1" strip of wall space. I'd rather have either 3-4" (more if you have the space). When we planned ours, we also took into account how big the cabinets could be when we played around with that wall space. We have about 4" between the door molding and the cabinet, which gave us a 30" upper cabinet. I didn't want the upper cabinet to be any smaller than 30" wide because I felt that was a good width for our everyday dishes. The same goes for the wall space between the window and cabinets...I just don't like a super thin (1" or so) strip of wall. To me it almost looks like a mistake. There again we have about 4" from the window molding to upper cabinets. Just don't forget to take into account how wide you'd like your upper cabinets to be for what you're storing there. I would work on that first, and then determine how much wall space you'll end up with. You can then adjust cabinet width by a few inches either way to end up with the best combination. Re: hood. It's my understanding that if you have a 36" hood over a 36" range, then you should allow 3" of open space on both sides of the hood. We have a 36" range with a 42" hood. Because the hood is already wider than the range, the hood will be flush against the upper cabinets. A knowledgeable appliance salesperson will be able to explain this better than I am.

I prefer a bit of breathing room between cabs and window/door casings so wouldn't re-do to push cabs to your casings. I have situation around my corner pantry casing that caused me to pause. Because of some framing issues, the exposed wall around the casing is small and not symmetrical on both sides. Instead of narrow, assymetrical strips of wall paint used elsewhere in the space, I painted them the trim color (also the cab color) so it all blends in together. In your case, I would paint with your wall color.

I think I'd do a ceiling mount rather than drill into molding. If that's not possible, I'd just put it at the very top. I'd only go out about 5" each side on that size window.

IMO no shelves and no corner cabinet open shelves are a PITA and near a range a total mess all the time This is how I handled some off windows in a renovation BTW I would move the fridge since I never like crossing in front of a range to get from fridge to sink and also make sure all the base cabinets are drawers too.