one half of the building spots are for rss (food, stone, iron, lumber) the other half are for  a few specific buiildings then infirmaries and manors (training boost and silver production) and barracks  (for training) ... most people do more manors than the other buildings on that "side" ...

Compared to Knowledge, buildings are quick and cheap in the early stages of the game so don't be afraid to demolish buildings and try something different.

For beginners (let's say up to palace 15), I recommend 1 Mine, 1 Mill, 1 Quarry and 22 Farms. 1 Barracks, 1 Infirmary and 13 Manors.

Having a lot of 1 or 2 types of resource building is the basis for "hyperfarming"  - focussing on  producing 1 or 2 resources. As well as the buildings, you  set your hero/shaman skills and get a legendary set of gear for those rss so that you can supply other clan members or the Stronghold. You have to keep using or giving away those rss or you stop producing.

If you are going to train a lot of troops, you will need to use boosts, the more manors you have the less boosts you need.

I would agree with you on that unexpect  (except) for the iron, I would go with 2 iron, 1 lumber, 1 quarry and the rest in farms.  Iron is slow producing I found and all run at an even keel (minus the food) after the specific rss cards are maxed in the rss hero set.  I get a healthy 2.4 M per rss in regards to stone, iron and lumber.

I would also go with 3 but no more than 4 barracks, 1 infirmary and Manors for the rest.  Reason being, big silver output with the manors along with a silver hero set and a training hero set to train a higher amount of troops with the barracks.