binary file reading in python

[Daniel Weber]

I've been mulling over a project to edit/view/search binary recipe files
for a production tool multi-platform (OS/2, VMS, NT, linux) and was
condidering using python.  However, the recipe files themselves are
stored in binary format which I would have to read in and parse.  I"ve
gone through my python books but have found no reference to reading in
binary files or any functions to deal with fixed size binary data types
like unsigned short, int and so on.  I know that I could write C code to
interface to python but that would mitigate the advantage of writing it
in python at all.  Are these type of read possible?