Refactor config for better readability

**Feature request**
It would be great to have serialization for utils.

**Use case**
Many users need this functionality for production deployments.

**Implementation idea**
Add a new config option `enable_serialization` with default `false`.

Start by locating the configuration handling and utils serialization entry points in the repository. Confirm where configuration defaults are defined and how serialization is expected to be exposed; done means the new option defaults to false and supports the stated production-deployment use case.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.