Polybar | A bar | Frontend Framework library

If, as you say, only half the script runs. Most likely, the parts that apparently don't run, they do actually run, but fail for some reason and you don't see the effect those commands normally have.

Programs generally write some kind of error messages in these cases. So this is mostly a debugging issue. For polybar, you already redirect the output to a logfile at /tmp/polybar1.log. This file will most likely contain information about why the bar couldn't start.

I suggest you do the same for your pywal script to see why it fails to set the wallpaper.

Yes this is possible.

You have to create multiple bars and position one of them at the top and the other at the bottom. In the bar section for each bar, there is a bottom setting. So for one bar you would set bottom = true and for the other bottom = false. This could look something like this:

You need to install a capable font and configure your terminal to use. Since you are using powerlevel10k, it's a good idea to use the font that powerlevel10k recommends.

Meslo Nerd Font patched for Powerlevel10k

Gorgeous monospace font designed by Jim Lyles for Bitstream, customized by the same for Apple, further customized by André Berg, and finally patched by yours truly with customized scripts originally developed by Ryan L McIntyre of Nerd Fonts. Contains all glyphs and symbols that Powerlevel10k may need. Battle-tested in dozens of different terminals on all major operating systems.

Automatic font installation

If you are using iTerm2 or Termux, p10k configure can install the recommended font for you. Simply answer Yes when asked whether to install Meslo Nerd Font.

If you are using a different terminal, proceed with manual font installation.

Manual font installation

Download these four ttf files:

• MesloLGS NF Regular.ttf
• MesloLGS NF Bold.ttf
• MesloLGS NF Italic.ttf
• MesloLGS NF Bold Italic.ttf

Double-click on each file and click "Install". This will make MesloLGS NF font available to all applications on your system. Configure your terminal to use this font:

• iTerm2: Open iTerm2 → Preferences → Profiles → Text and set Font to MesloLGS NF. Alternatively, type p10k configure and answer Yes when asked whether to install Meslo Nerd Font.
• Apple Terminal Open Terminal → Preferences → Profiles → Text, click Change under Font and select MesloLGS NF family.
• Hyper: Open Hyper → Edit → Preferences and change the value of fontFamily under module.exports.config to MesloLGS NF.
• Visual Studio Code: Open File → Preferences → Settings, enter terminal.integrated.fontFamily in the search box and set the value to MesloLGS NF.
• GNOME Terminal (the default Ubuntu terminal): Open Terminal → Preferences and click on the selected profile under Profiles. Check Custom font under Text Appearance and select MesloLGS NF Regular.
• Konsole: Open Settings → Edit Current Profile → Appearance, click Select Font and select MesloLGS NF Regular.
• Tilix: Open Tilix → Preferences and click on the selected profile under Profiles. Check Custom font under Text Appearance and select MesloLGS NF Regular.
• Windows Console Host (the old thing): Click the icon in the top left corner, then Properties → Font and set Font to MesloLGS NF.
• Windows Terminal (the new thing): Open Settings (Ctrl+,), search for fontFace and set value to MesloLGS NF for every profile.
• Termux: Type p10k configure and answer Yes when asked whether to install Meslo Nerd Font.

IMPORTANT: Run p10k configure after changing terminal font. The old ~/.p10k.zsh may work incorrectly with the new font.

I don't think there is a way to force WMs to reserve space but many WMs support and respect the _NET_WM_STRUT_PARTIAL EWMH property to reserve space at the edge of the screen. This is also what both lemonbar and polybar do.

From the EWMH Spec:

_NET_WM_STRUT_PARTIAL

_NET_WM_STRUT_PARTIAL, left, right, top, bottom, left_start_y, left_end_y, right_start_y, right_end_y, top_start_x, top_end_x, bottom_start_x, bottom_end_x,CARDINAL[12]/32

This property MUST be set by the Client if the window is to reserve space at the edge of the screen. The property contains 4 cardinals specifying the width of the reserved area at each border of the screen, and an additional 8 cardinals specifying the beginning and end corresponding to each of the four struts. The order of the values is left, right, top, bottom, left_start_y, left_end_y, right_start_y, right_end_y, top_start_x, top_end_x, bottom_start_x, bottom_end_x. All coordinates are root window coordinates. The client MAY change this property at any time, therefore the Window Manager MUST watch for property notify events if the Window Manager uses this property to assign special semantics to the window.

[...]

For example, for a panel-style Client appearing at the bottom of the screen, 50 pixels tall, and occupying the space from 200-600 pixels from the left of the screen edge would set a bottom strut of 50, and set bottom_start_x to 200 and bottom_end_x to 600. [...]

Update: After digging around the SFML documentation a bit, I am not sure how to set EMWH properties via SFML or if it is even possible at all. You will need to figure this out yourself. If it isn't possible, one route would be to somehow get the window handle (xcb_window_t) from SFML and use something like xcb_change_property from libxcb to set the _NET_WM_STRUT_PARTIAL property. See the lemonbar source for reference.

Update 2: I am not really familiar with Xlib but I often look at the stalonetray source code for reference. For example the ewmh_set_window_strut function in the src/wmh.c file shows how to set the _NET_WM_STRUT_PARTIAL property:

The issue is that inside the print_volume function, I was repeatedly sourcing a file with exports in it. As pointed out by Charles Duffy, this caused the environment size to be too large.

you could enable i3 debugging

if using ~/.xsession

I ran xrandr --listmonitors on my system, with and without cloned monitors:

Not cloned:

Your script runs as a child of your current shell. Child processes cannot directly modify the environment of their parent. That includes environment variables, the current working directory, how signals are handled, etcetera. A process can only modify its environment and, implicitly, the environment of any processes it starts.

The export in your script works fine. But it only modifies the value for that script or any child processes (e.g., other scripts) it spawns. By definition it cannot change the value in its parent process.

Solution 1: Implement the script as a shell function. Since functions run in the context of the current shell they can modify its state including its env vars.

Solution 2: Store the STATE value somewhere like a dot file in the user's home directory.