Shuffling variables

[ERMEGM]

Well, you are having great difficulty because you cannot reassign ports like that in the program. Ports are only assigned to variables at the beginning of the program.

Yes I know this. I was having difficulty because I was trying to think of a way to do it in a manner that the pic would understand. Our brains can easily process this and substitute that values, but with the pic, it's not that easy.

looks like a dead end to me . try this way
code is for a 12f1822 so uses porta and porta.3 is input only . but you get the idea

'****************************************************************
'*  Name    : UNTITLED.BAS                                      *
'*  Author  : [select VIEW...EDITOR OPTIONS]                    *
'*  Notice  : Copyright (c) 2014 [select VIEW...EDITOR OPTIONS] *
'*          : All Rights Reserved                               *
'*  Date    : 29/11/2014                                        *
'*  Version : 1.0                                               *
'*  Notes   :                                                   *
'*          :   pic12f1822                                                *
'****************************************************************
#CONFIG
cfg1 = _FOSC_INTOSC
cfg1&= _WDTE_ON
cfg1&= _PWRTE_OFF
cfg1&= _MCLRE_ON
cfg1&= _CP_OFF
cfg1&= _CPD_OFF
cfg1&= _BOREN_ON
cfg1&= _CLKOUTEN_OFF
cfg1&= _IESO_ON
cfg1&= _FCMEN_ON
  __CONFIG _CONFIG1, cfg1
cfg2 = _WRT_OFF
cfg2&= _PLLEN_OFF
cfg2&= _STVREN_ON
cfg2&= _BORV_19
cfg2&= _LVP_OFF
  __CONFIG _CONFIG2, cfg2
#ENDCONFIG

   osccon=$6a    '4 mhz
   anselA=0  
   trisa=
000
   
  a  var  byte
  b  var  byte
  c  var  byte
  d  var  byte
  pin_mode var byte
  x var byte
  
  a=0
  b=1
  c=2
  d=4
  pin_mode=0
 
 action:
  for x = 1 to 5
  lata.0[a] = 1
  lata.0[b] = 1
  lata.0[c]= 0
  lata.0[d]= 0
  pause 200
  lata.0[a] = 0
  lata.0[b] = 0
  lata.0[c]= 0
  lata.0[d]= 0
  pause 200
  next x
  for x = 1 to 5
  lata.0[a] = 0
  lata.0[b] = 0
  lata.0[c]= 1
  lata.0[d]= 1
  pause 200
  lata.0[a] = 0
  lata.0[b] = 0
  lata.0[c]= 0
  lata.0[d]= 0
  pause 200
  next x
  gosub shuffle
  goto action
  
   shuffle :
   pin_mode=pin_mode+1
  select case pin_mode
  case 1
   a=4  ;a  var  portb.3
   b=2  ;b  var  portb.2
   c=1   ;c  var  portb.1
   d=0    ;d  var  portb.0
  case 2
   a=0  ;a  var  portb.0
   b=4  ;b  var  portb.3
   c=2   ;c  var  portb.2
   d=1    ;d  var  portb.1
  case 3
   a=0  ;a  var  portb.0
   b=2  ;b  var  portb.2
   c=1   ;c  var  portb.1
   d=4    ;d  var  portb.3 
  case 4
   a=0  ;a  var  portb.0
   b=1  ;b  var  portb.1
   c=2   ;c  var  portb.2
   d=4    ;d  var  portb.3 
   pin_mode=0
  end select
  return

That's exactly what I was envisioning in my head, but I couldn't get it out. Thank you Richard. I'll try to plug this into my code and see how it works.