Protocol Buffers and Thrift are good formats for data serialization, but they are less popular in dynamic languages like Python than schemaless alternatives like JSON because of the need to run a code generator on the schema file to create the necessary classes. CodeGenLoader is a Python import hook that automatically and transparently runs the necessary code generator at import time. It includes support for both Thrift and Protocol Buffers, with an extensible base class that can be used to add more code generators.

All you need is two lines of magic in an __init__.py:

import codegenloader.protobuf
__path__ = codegenloader.protobuf.make_path(__name__, ".")

Get it with pip install codegenloader or check out the source on github.