You can try the BashrcGenerator. This is by far the easiest way to get a prompt like you want. I've noticed that the colors defined here may be different from your own system, but that's a small issue. With the generated code you can change the colors yourself.
Server user:
export PS1="\[\e[01;37m\][\[\e[0m\]\[\e[01;32m\]\u\[\e[0m\]\[\e[00;37m\]@\[\e[0m\]\[\e[01;34m\]\h\[\e[0m\]\[\e[00;37m\] \[\e[0m\]\[\e[00;37m\]\t\[\e[0m\]\[\e[01;37m\] \W]\\$ \[\e[0m\]"
Server root:
export PS1="\[\e[01;37m\][\[\e[0m\]\[\e[01;31m\]\u\[\e[0m\]\[\e[00;37m\]@\[\e[0m\]\[\e[01;34m\]\h\[\e[0m\]\[\e[00;37m\] \[\e[0m\]\[\e[00;37m\]\t\[\e[0m\]\[\e[01;37m\] \W]\\$ \[\e[0m\]"
And if needed you can change hostname color to reflect different type of servers.
I use different format for my local computer:
export PS1="\[\e[01;33m\]\u\[\e[0m\]\[\e[00;37m\]@\[\e[0m\]\[\e[01;36m\]\h\[\e[0m\]\[\e[00;37m\] \t \[\e[0m\]\[\e[01;35m\]\w\[\e[0m\]\[\e[01;37m\] > \[\e[0m\]"
My favorite now:
export PS1="\n\[\e[01;33m\]\u\[\e[0m\]\[\e[00;37m\]@\[\e[0m\]\[\e[01;36m\]\h\[\e[0m\]\[\e[00;37m\] \t \[\e[0m\]\[\e[01;35m\]\w\[\e[0m\]\[\e[01;37m\] \[\e[0m\]\n$ "
This last prompt has one nice touch. It adds a newline after the prompt, and an empty newline before. Now you can display the complete directory path without problem, and it makes it more clear where a new command starts, in case of long output.
bash
settings (or settings for your preferred shell), not Gnome Terminal. – Scott Severance Apr 19 '12 at 0:50