Support export configuration

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

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

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

No files or tests are named. Start by locating the configuration handling and API serialization entry points, then determine the expected serialized output and how production deployments consume it. Done means the new option defaults to false and the serialization behavior is covered by tests.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.