class StructuredData( object):

    def __init__( self, format, members, buf, offset):
        self.buf = buf
        self.format = "<" + format # little-endian
        self.members = members
        self.offset = offset
        # determine size of structured data
        self.size = struct.calcsize( self.format)
        # unpack structured data according to the specified format into a tuple
        data = struct.unpack( self.format, buf[ self.offset: self.offset + self.size])
        # use the tuple of member names and the tuple of values to create members of this class
        map( lambda ( member, value): setattr( self, member, value), zip( self.members, data))

    def dump( self):
        values = map( functools.partial( getattr, self), self.members)
        packer = functools.partial( struct.pack, self.format)
        for value in values:
            packer = functools.partial( packer, value)
        return packer()